Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/823044.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Teen_Wolf_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Derek_Hale/Stiles_Stilinski
  Character:
      Derek_Hale, Stiles_Stilinski, Alan_Deaton, Isaac_Lahey
  Additional Tags:
      Not_a_Deathfic, even_though_it_seems_like_a_deathfic_for_a_while, but_i
      don't_write_deathfics, that_being_said_someone_does_die, totally_not_a
      deathfic_though, Frottage, First_Time
  Stats:
      Published: 2013-05-30 Completed: 2013-06-06 Chapters: 3/3 Words: 22213
****** Thirteen O'Clock ******
by kyrene
Summary
     The thing about an actual real-life cockatrice that none of them had
     known, which would have been good to know before the fact, was that
     it wasn't just its gaze that could kill a man.
***** Chapter 1 *****
The thing about an actual real-life cockatrice that none of them had known,
which would have been good to know before the fact, was that it wasn't just its
gaze that could kill a man.
"Deaton!"
Derek's voice cracked through the veterinary clinic, Alpha-loud and commanding
but at the same time frantically desperate. It set the kenneled dogs to barking
and the cats to crying, but more importantly it summoned Alan Deaton out of the
back and into the lobby.
The front door had been closed and locked since it was just after closing time,
but that hadn't stopped Derek. One boot to the handle and it had flown open
hard enough to leave an imprint on the wall beside it.
Deaton didn't complain, though, because one look at the limp body held tightly
in Derek's arms had him in motion.
"Bring him into the back and tell me what happened," he instructed firmly
without leaving Derek any room to argue or question him as he turned and strode
in the direction he had indicated. No that Derek was inclined to do anything
other than what he'd been told to do.
"On the table," Deaton instructed, and Derek set his burden down as gently as
he was able when he felt like scratching down the walls of the world.
"Tell me what happened," Deaton repeated, pressing his stethoscope to the pale,
unmoving chest. If it wasn't for his werewolf hearing Derek would actually
assume that he'd gotten there too late, but it wasn't too late... yet.
In short, staccato beats, Derek explained what had happened. It didn't really
take too long.
Deaton already knew about the cockatrice; he'd been the one to tell them what
had been roaming the woods of the Preserve and killing deer and squirrels. He'd
been the one to tell them to avoid looking at it, and he'd supplied them with
the weasel that he guaranteed would kill it once they'd captured it.
With their werewolf senses, the pack hadn't needed their sight to hunt the
deadly creature, which was precisely what they had been doing when this
disaster had happened. Each of them had been equipped with a small cage and a
bag to throw over the caged cockatrice once they'd caught the damned thing,
each of them had been using their enhanced sense to track down and capture the
foul creature....
And Derek had no idea what Stiles had been doing there.
Derek hadn't informed Stiles of the existence of the cockatrice since Stiles
was human and couldn't help with their hunt. Stiles was the son of the Sheriff,
though, and so he was probably aware that there was something strange going on
in the area. That was probably why he'd been there. After all, it had been his
idea to go searching for the other half of Laura's body when a rogue Alpha had
torn her apart in the woods, and look how that had ended; with his best friend
being bitten and turned.
Even taking Stiles' curiosity into account, Derek hadn't thought he'd have to
tell the obnoxious teen to stay away... and he could only regret that oversight
now.
"It must have brushed against his leg," Deaton said quietly once Derek had done
explaining how Stiles had managed to call Derek on his cell and whine out a
pained plea for help, how Derek had smelled Stiles close to his position in the
Preserve, how he had burst out of the trees to find Stiles lying in a limp
jumble of loose limbs next to his Jeep, how he'd shoved Stiles into the
passenger seat and broken at least a dozen traffic laws on his way to Deaton's
clinic.
Derek was about to ask what Deaton was basing this assumption on when the vet
lifted the hem of Stiles' jeans and exposed the skin of his calf. Only, Derek
saw with a sharp chill, it wasn't flesh anymore. It was stone. Or if it wasn't,
it damned near looked like it.
"The effects are much slower with this sort of contact," Deaton was saying, the
words echoing strangely through the buzz in Derek's ears. "If he had looked
directly at it, he'd be gone already. As it is, he's slowly turning to stone...
from the inside out."
Derek thought he might vomit as this reality forced its way into his mind.
Stiles could be a royal pain in Derek's ass, but he was laying there, cold and
turning slowly to stone and for all the times Derek had threatened Stiles with
physical violence, he'd never actually wanted him to die.
"Do something," he demanded, the words ripped out of him painful and raw,
instead of coming out as the booming command he wanted.
"I'll do what I can," Deaton said. Derek hated him not a little for remaining
calm even in a situation like this, when Stiles was slowly dying on his
examination table. And he thought he hated him even more for not promising
definitively to save Stiles' life, for not giving him hope. "Talk to him and
keep him engaged, Derek. I need you to try to slow the progression of the
petrifaction while I go and create an antidote."
"What?" Derek looked at Stiles, shifting closer to the table even though his
instincts were urging him to run away, to flee from the reality of his failure
to keep Stiles safe, to be anywhere other than here when Stiles' heart stopped
beating, when his lungs ceased dragging in agonizingly slow breath after
agonizingly slow breath.
"He's already too far gone to hear me," he protested, because Stiles' chest was
barely even moving and his eyelids rested heavily closed against his chalky
cheeks. There was no way he could hear Derek talking to him, much less speak in
return.
"Talk to him," Deaton said firmly, moving away from the table. "Talk to him
until he talks back, Derek. I know you can do that."
Then Deaton vanished into the next room, and even though he left the door ajar
Derek felt as though he was completely alone with Stiles. Who was dying.
Derek shuffled closer, sniffing Stiles cautiously. Over and under and pervading
his normal scent was the sour reek of fear and a brittle, unnatural odor that
Derek assumed was his body petrifying. It didn't really smell like stone, but
it definitely wasn't anything that was supposed to be part of a human body.
"D'rk...."
"I'm here," he answered promptly, because even though Stiles' unexpected voice
had startled him enough to have his fangs dropping slightly and his claws
aching in their beds, he couldn't just leave Stiles laying there alone and
dying. It just figured that Stiles had spoken to him first, even though Deaton
had entreated Derek to rouse Stiles.
There was a little more color in Stiles' cheeks now, Derek thought, even though
he was still corpse-pale. His thick lashes fluttered and Derek experienced a
moment of hope, hope that Deaton had exaggerated, hope that he hadn't really
seen Stiles' skin turning to stone underneath his pant leg....
Then Stiles managed to drag his eyes open and Derek wanted to vomit all over
again.
Instead of the familiar dark brown with amber highlights, blank grey orbs fixed
blindly on Derek. They didn't look like stone, yet, but his eyes resembled
filmy marbles, and Derek really doubted that Stiles was actually seeing him. He
was pretty sure that there was no way Stiles was seeing anything.
"Derek, please," Stiles breathed, and his heartbeat had picked up a little, so
Derek thought that maybe Deaton had a point, about talking to him. Now, if only
he could figure out what to say.
"I'm here," he repeated, listening hopefully to the deeper breaths and the
thumping of Stiles' pulse. "Stiles, what were you doing in the woods?"
Stiles didn't reply. His fingers twitched, scratching at the metal of the exam
table he was lying on, and Derek wondered if it was cold, turning to stone. He
wondered if it hurt. He didn't think he should ask Stiles those questions, even
though Stiles probably would have blurted them out if their roles had been
reversed.
"Hang in there," he said awkwardly, because Stiles evidently wasn't going to
answer him and he was beginning to smell more strongly of that really wrong
scent.
He was turning to stone right in front of Derek, and there was nothing Derek
could do to stop it. "Stiles, we're at Deaton's, and he's going to fix you."
Stiles' breath caught in his throat, almost as though he was choking, and he
managed to shift his face a little more toward Derek. His fingers twitched
again, the scratching of his nails against the metal making the hair on the
nape of Derek's neck rise. Or maybe that was just his own sense of
helplessness. He was the Alpha. He was supposed to protect his pack. And even
if Stiles' wasn't technically his... well, sometimes he felt like the boy was.
"Did you hear me?" Derek asked. "Stiles...."
"Cold," Stiles hissed out, and this answered one of Derek's unasked questions,
but he wasn't happy about that fact. His lashes fluttered, and while the sight
of his blank, staring eyes was freaking Derek the hell out, he was suddenly
terrified that Stiles was going to close his lids and slide away from him
entirely.
"Hang in there," he said for the third time, knowing that he was making a
complete mess of this, but unable to think of anything more helpful to say.
Deaton had said to keep Stiles talking, but almost anyone would have been
better at this task than Derek. Hell, even Boyd might have been better. Maybe
not Peter, though.
"Derek," Stiles breathed, so quietly that Derek wouldn't have heard him if not
for his enhanced werewolf senses. "Please...."
"What?" Derek asked, leaning in closer even though he was coming to loathe the
reek of pending death that was permeating Stiles' skin.
Stiles didn't reply, letting his eyes slide closed, and Derek reminded himself
that he could still hear Stiles' heart beating, could still see his quiet
breaths lifting and lowering his chest. It was a relief to no longer be looking
at those glassy eyes and this sense of relief made Derek feel like a complete
asshole.
"Deaton!" he darted over to the room the vet was in, panic causing his own
heart to pound, knowing that his eyes were bright red, but unable to help it.
He wanted to fight death in order to keep Stiles alive, he'd lost everyone else
he'd ever--
Derek cut that thought off abruptly before it could completely form, but it was
still ringing loud and clear inside him. He cared, he cared whether Stiles
lived or died, and he couldn't stand the thought of a world without one
annoying, obnoxious, bold, self-sacrificing Stiles Stilinski.
"Stiles is dying!" he snarled at Deaton, hating the man for remaining calm in
the face of this impending horror, even though he knew that Deaton was really
the only best chance Stiles had. "He's dying right now!"
Deaton was doing something arcane with jars of strange smelling powders and
liquids and what looked like a mortar and pestle, and he looked up, giving
Derek a glare that was the most expression Derek had ever seen on his face. It
might have been frightening if Derek hadn't been more afraid of losing Stiles.
"And you are leaving him to die alone," Deaton said, his voice even but louder
than usual. "Not to mention interrupting me while I'm trying to help. I'm doing
what I can, Derek. Leave me to it and go comfort Stiles."
Derek swallowed tightly, taking the truth of Deaton's words and internalizing
it. He retreated and returned to the dying boy, then for the first time since
he had set him down on the table, he touched Stiles.
Placing his hand over Stiles' chest felt right. Derek was a tactile being, as
his entire family had been, though he'd been less so since they'd all died. But
Stiles... Derek rarely touched Stiles, except to threaten him or to attempt to
save his life. Possibly because Stiles was not a member of Derek's pack.
Possibly because he felt Stiles would take it poorly. Or possibly... because of
the feelings that roused deep inside Derek's burnt husk of a heart when he laid
hands on Stiles. The instinct that told him to grab hold and never let go. So
best not to touch Stiles in the first place, right?
Derek was touching Stiles now, though. His chest was firm under Derek's palm,
too firm and he was cold. Derek shuddered, leaning in again in order to prevent
himself from running out of the clinic in a blind panic. This wasn't something
that was about him; this was all about Stiles. Derek's reactions were secondary
at best. Not even that. He was here for Stiles.
"Stiles," he said in his Alpha voice. "Wake up."
Stiles shifted, his head turning toward Derek. "Don't.... Don't want to die
alone," he whispered. Derek didn't know whether he'd heard what Deaton had said
-- probably not, considering his human hearing and the fact that he was fading
fast -- but the pained wheeze of Stiles' voice speaking that sentence wrenched
at Derek's heart in ways Deaton's words had not done.
"I'm right here," he said, trying to sound reassuring instead of lost and
traumatized, no matter how he was feeling. "You're not alone." That was really
all that he could offer Stiles right now, no matter how much he wished he could
tell him he wasn't going to die.
"Can't see you," Stiles whimpered, his chest rising and falling faintly under
Derek's hand. "Can't see, Derek."
"I know," Derek said, mangling the words out through lengthening fangs, even
though this was nothing tangible here he could fight. Only the bleak reality of
mortality. "I'm right here, though."
Stiles jerked and Derek swallowed tightly, but it seemed to be deliberate as
Stiles' hand came up to clasp frigid and loose around his wrist.
"Can feel you," Stiles coughed out. "Can't see you. D'rk, don't wan' die
alone."
"I'm here," Derek assured him again, his throat aching. He knew what he had to
do, he didn't have any real reason not to do it, and yet it still felt like
something inside him shattered as he reached out and dragged Stiles' limp body
into his arms.
"See? I'm right here," he murmured into the thin skin of Stiles' temple. Stiles
let out a low sound in response and it broke Derek inside even more, but made
him all the more certain of his actions.
It was beyond awkward, trying to hold onto Stiles where he was on the table,
and Derek shot a glance toward the other room, where he could smell something
vile and acrid being brewed up. Making a decision with his heart and not his
head, he carefully pulled Stiles into his arms and lifted him down off the
table, settling crosslegged on the floor with Stiles safely in his embrace.
"Stay awake," he commanded, holding Stiles close and letting Stiles' head rest
against his shoulder. He'd been a little concerned that this wouldn't work
because Deaton had said that Stiles was turning to stone, but Stiles' still
bent at all his joints easily enough, ending up curled in Derek's lap as though
he belonged there, pressed against his torso.
Stiles shuddered once, then was eerily still. Derek felt frantic but he held it
in because Stiles' heart was still beating and he couldn't let go now that he
was finally holding him close, the way he wanted, the way he needed.
"Derek...."
Deaton had said to keep Stiles talking, keep him responding, but Derek had no
idea how to go about doing that, he thought with a sick feeling in the back of
his throat. Stiles was in his arms but he was slipping away. He smelled more
and more like stone and death, less like teenage boy and boundless energy the
way he normally did. His heart was slowing and each inhalation was more
shallow, each exhalation weakening. He was dying in Derek's arms and there was
nothing Derek could do to stop it.
"Stay alive, Stiles," he said, trying to speak evenly when his throat was so
tight it ached. "You've got to stay alive."
"Trying," Stiles huffed, then his entire body shook again and Derek swore his
temperature plunged several degrees. "S'hard... hurts....."
"Living always hurts more than giving up," Derek said, not even knowing what he
was saying but needing to keep Stiles talking. As long as he was talking he was
alive. "But we need to keep living, we can't just give up. You need to keep
living. Don't you give up!"
"Not sure... have a choice," Stiles breathed out, and if he didn't have
werewolf senses Derek was sure he'd never have heard what Stiles was saying.
His voice was a reedy thread and his pulse had slowed so much that Derek
couldn't believe he was still conscious and speaking.
"Stiles, keep breathing. Keep talking. Keep living."
"Can't...."
"You can," Derek said fiercely. He clutched Stiles to him as though this would
keep death at bay, and maybe that was what Stiles needed. His flesh was hard
and way too solid under Derek's grasping hands, so this more heavy touch was
probably the only way he was going to actually feel that Derek was holding him.
"Don't you give up, Stiles."
He'd meant to command him, in his Alpha voice, but somehow it came out too
entreating and desperate for that.
"Sorry," Stiles wheezed, and he was still talking, even though Derek could feel
his body ceasing to function, because that was just how stubborn Stiles was.
"Sorry... can't... D'rk."
"If you're sorry, then live," Derek said fiercely, dragging Stiles into the
hunch of his chest, pressing his face into the curve of his neck. He didn't
think he'd be able to hurt him at this point, and he wanted, he needed to keep
Stiles with him. "Don't you leave us, Stiles. Your father needs you. I need--"
He broke off, not because he didn't know how to finish that sentence -- it
might as well have finished itself on its way out his mouth -- but because
Stiles' heart had stuttered and missed a beat.
"No!"
"S'rry," Stiles slurred, and since he was beyond the point of movement, Derek
drew him in even closer, holding him impossibly tightly. "Sorry... dying in y'r
arms...."
"Stiles!" Derek could feel his own heart beating double time, as though that
could make up for Stiles' heart slowing and stopping. "Stiles, don't you dare
give up!"
"Take c'r of Dad f'r me," Stiles mumbled into the skin of Derek's neck, no heat
or moisture at all to his breath. That sensation was as horrifying as the words
that he was saying. "Please."
"I will," Derek promised. Because even though he wanted to rant and rail at
Stiles, tell him he had to live for his father, tell Stiles that losing him
would break his father, there was no amount of denial that would convince Derek
that Stiles wasn't dying in his arms right now and he couldn't have that on his
conscience. He didn't want to live with knowing that he hadn't given Stiles
this most important reassurance in his last moments.
"I will," he repeated, a little more loudly, holding Stiles close, feeling him
growing heavier in his arms as he petrified further, "But you need to stay with
me so that I don't have to. Stiles, you can't really want to leave your
father's health in my hands, can you?"
He was trying, he really was, but it was too late. They both knew it. Stiles
let out a little breath and Derek didn't know if it was a sigh, a laugh, or his
soul trying to escape.
"Thanks for not letting me die alone," Stiles whispered, surprisingly
articulate, but once he'd spoken that sentence his breathing faltered and his
heart slowed so much that Derek thought at first it had completely stopped
beating.
It hadn't quite stopped, but it might as well have done because Stiles wasn't
there anymore, Derek sensed instinctively.
"DEATON!" he bellowed, and then he coiled in more tightly around Stiles' body,
holding him close. Stiles was still present, physically, but as moments passed
and there was no Deaton, as Derek cradled Stiles' stiffening body and willed
himself not to start rocking where he sat, he could hear his heart slowing...
slowing... stopping.
Derek allowed himself one little whine before he closed his reactions off
entirely. He'd thought... he'd thought that Deaton would be able to save
Stiles. He'd thought bringing him here was the right thing to do. He hadn't
thought when the hunt for the cockatrice had begun that he'd end the evening
with Stiles dying in his arms.
What was he going to tell the Sheriff...? This was going to destroy the man.
Derek knew the pain of losing family members; he couldn't even begin to imagine
how it would feel to lose a child. Empathy had never been one of Derek's strong
points, and the fire that had claimed his family had burned a lot of his heart
out of him, but he felt grief for the Sheriff almost as much as he did for
himself. A life without Stiles....
"Derek. Derek!"
It sounded as though Deaton had been trying to capture his attention for
several seconds now.
"I've got the antidote," Deaton informed him urgently, but he might as well
have been speaking another language for all the sense it made to Derek's ears.
"Derek, let me see Stiles."
"It doesn't matter," Derek ground out, and he realized his eyes were tightly
closed, as though he was unwilling to face the reality of Stiles' death.
"Doesn't matter anymore."
"Derek," Deaton sounded angry, which was ridiculous, because what use was
emotion now that Stiles was dead? "Derek, let go."
Pure shock had him releasing Stiles as Deaton took hold of Stiles' body and
tugged. Derek couldn't believe that Deaton had dared....
Then Stiles was on the floor, his hand making a heavy "clunk" sound when it
fell that had Derek's gorge rising. He forced himself to look, to fix his gaze
on yet another person he had failed.
Stiles didn't look as though he was completely petrified. His face was pale but
the features were still flesh, and if Derek pretended, he might have just
looked as though he was very deeply asleep. Derek's ears told another tale,
though. There was no breath, no heartbeat.
"You may not trust me," Deaton was scolding Derek, pushing up Stiles' teeshirt
and exposing his bare chest, "But trust that I know what I'm doing here."
Derek held himself perfectly still and watched in something that was probably
some form of shock as Deaton prepared a hypodermic needle and drove it without
hesitation into Stiles' chest, to the left of his breastbone, slanted slightly,
piercing expertly and unerringly into his heart.
He depressed the plunger and yanked the needle out, dropping it then grabbing a
portable defibrillator.
"His heart has already stopped," Derek informed Deaton, knowing that despite
what television and movies depicted, the defibrillator couldn't restart a pulse
that had vanished. Deaton only had human senses, so maybe he didn't realize
that Stiles was gone.
"I know that," Deaton snapped out, quickly preparing the paddles and setting
them on Stiles' chest, above and below his heart, to either side of it. "But
this in combination with the dose I administered...."
He didn't finish this sentence because he was too busy pressing down on Stiles'
chest with at least the requisite amount of weight, maybe even more, and
triggering the defibrillator.
Derek desperately listened, and then almost fell over in shock when Stiles'
heart jumped and beat. Once, twice, and then slowly but steadily picking up,
headed toward a normal rate. After another moment, Stiles drew in a breath,
then another, still shallow and uneven, but he was breathing.
"Oh, good, that worked," Deaton said, smiling a little to himself, and Derek
felt panicked in retrospect to find that Deaton hadn't been sure when he'd
dosed Stiles. He thought that he might want to have some words with Deaton
later, but right now Stiles was back, he was recovering from the cockatrice's
poisoned touch, and Deaton didn't stop Derek as he reached out and collected
Stiles into his arms again.
"Hold onto him," Deaton instructed seriously, moving to clean up the items he'd
used to revive Stiles. Not that Derek needed to be told. He clutched Stiles to
him, and he held on tight as life returned to Stiles' body a lot more quickly
than death had overtaken it.
Derek had been right; dying had been easy, living was hard.
Stiles twitched and shuddered and shook in the circle of Derek's arms. Tiny
choked off sounds came out of his throat, little whimpers of pain even though
he didn't seem to have regained consciousness yet. His mouth hung open and
Derek stared down at it in awful fascination. Stiles was in pain, it clearly
hurt him as his body came back to full functionality, but he was alive and his
mouth was ruddy-pink again, his breath gusting hot and wet through those red
lips.
The noises he was making were sounds of pain, true, and it hurt Derek to hear
them but they meant that Stiles was living.
"Just hang on," Deaton told him, rising and leaving the room. Derek was
thankful for the illusion of privacy, however long it was going to last, and he
thought that Stiles might be glad for it too, if he'd been at all aware. Not
that he was.
Stiles let out little distressed whines, but his breathing was growing deeper
and his pulse was growing stronger. Derek held him close and now he rocked,
because it was to comfort Stiles, not himself.
"It's okay," he murmured into the thin skin over Stiles' temple, digging his
fingers into Stiles' hair and massaging his scalp gently. "It'll be okay."
He offered Stiles the same reassurances he thought he'd like to get himself if
he'd been in Stiles' place, and he didn't allow himself to stop and think about
how vulnerable this was making him, how foolish he probably sounded. The only
thing that really mattered was getting Stiles to stop making the soft little
broken sounds, and since neither the Sheriff nor Scott where here, it was up to
Derek.
He thought, briefly, that he should probably call Scott on his cell to come for
Stiles. But he didn't want to give Stiles' care over to Scott. Derek had been
the one who had been here when Stiles had died, and he was going to stick with
him as he came back to life, safe and whole and un-petrified.
Now Stiles' fingers were spasming, and he was heaving in great gulps of air,
and Derek held on tight, doing his best to keep Stiles from shaking himself
apart. His heart had quickened to a rapid patter in his chest, and Derek was
calling out for Deaton before he even thought.
"Just hold on," Deaton repeated, suddenly appearing beside them, crouching and
placing a warm hand on Derek's shoulder. "He'll calm in a moment. Help him to
calm down, Derek."
Even though he knew Deaton was here now, hearing him, seeing him, Derek cradled
Stiles close and murmured soothingly into his sweat-beaded brow. His skin was
warm, then it was hot, and Derek looked at Deaton in fear, but Deaton just
nodded and smiled placidly.
"His body's burning out the last of the toxins," he told Derek evenly,
soothingly. "Just give him another moment. He'll be all right."
Derek glared, not at Deaton, just because he was angry that Stiles had actually
died minutes before and was suffering now. He held Stiles close, carding his
fingers through his damp hair, still swaying slightly where he was sitting, and
true to Deaton's promise Stiles began to settle, the feverish heat of his body
fading into a normal temperature. His breathing eased and his heart was beating
steadily. Derek didn't think he had ever heard such a beautiful sound.
Stiles' body was warm and limp, not cold and petrified. His cheek was smashed
up against Derek's shoulder and if he was drooling a little, Derek didn't care.
He was just grateful that Stiles was alive.
"He won't wake," Deaton informed Derek quietly. "Not for a while; his system
has gone through too much in too short a period of time. Set him back on the
table and I'll give him a quick examination while you call your Betas. Then you
can take him home or call someone to do it."
"I'll take him home," Derek hurried to say, and while he didn't want to let go
of Stiles, he did as directed, lifting him up onto the examination table and
stepping away.
"We got it," Isaac told him cheerfully once Derek had managed to fumble his
phone out with hands that were unaccountably shaking. "And the weasel did the
trick, just like Deaton said. We called, but you didn't answer, so we left
messages. Where are you?"
He sounded quizzical rather than panicked, and Derek boggled over the notion
that elsewhere, outside Deaton's clinic, life had gone on like normal. Here in
the clinic Stiles had died and Derek had felt everything inside him shatter. It
seemed strange that no one else knew about what had happened yet.
"At Deaton's."
"Are you okay?" Now Isaac sounded worried.
"The cockatrice touched Stiles," Derek bit out, trying to remain calm. The
worst of it was over. Stiles was alive, Derek could hear his heart beating
steadily where Deaton was hovering over his unconscious body. "He almost died.
Deaton helped."
Isaac made a sound of mild distress. "Stiles is okay now, though?"
"He is." Derek swallowed tightly. That was the truth, but it wasn't the whole
truth. He didn't have it in him to tell Isaac the whole truth. "I'm taking him
home soon. I don't know when I'll get back."
"Okay." Isaac sounded a little confused, for which Derek couldn't blame him.
"You're all safe?" he asked, because Stiles had died when the thing had brushed
against his leg, and his Betas had been running around in the woods with their
eyes closed.
"We're fine," Isaac replied, and now he was beginning to sound more concerned
than confused. "Are you...?"
"Fine," Derek said, doing his best not to bark the word, because Isaac didn't
deserve that. He didn't really have any clue how bad it had been. He only knew
what Derek had told him.
"Okay." Now Isaac was being cautious. "What about the weasel?"
"Weasel?"
"The one Deaton gave us? That killed the cockatrice?" Isaac chuckled. "It's
cute. I think Erica wants to keep it as a pet."
Derek scowled and shook his head. He would have to deal with the whole weasel
thing, he supposed, but not right now. Not when his nerve endings were still
raw and aching from what he had just been through, what he'd had to helplessly
watch Stiles go through.
"We'll talk later," he told Isaac brusquely and hung up. It was a little rude,
even for him, but Derek couldn't handle any more conversation right now, not
even with one of his Betas.
"He's going to be all right, Derek," Deaton said, making it sound more as
though he had just finished his examination of Stiles than that he was
reassuring Derek of that fact. "He needs a good night's sleep, and he'll be
sore and weak for a while once he wakes, but he will wake."
Derek nodded. "Should I...?" His hands twitched at his sides.
"Go ahead and take him home," Deaton said softly, reaching over and squeezing
Derek's upper arm briefly, a comforting touch that didn't last long enough to
get Derek's hackles up. He felt as though all of his defenses had been stripped
away and Deaton had seen to the heart of him. He didn't like it but there was
no taking it back. He still didn't trust Deaton, but so far the man hadn't done
anything to harm him and he'd certainly helped him tonight.
Derek had driven Stiles' Jeep to the clinic, since that had been the vehicle
he'd been lying next to when Derek had found him in the woods, so it wasn't too
difficult to get Stiles into his own car and then drive him home.
Thankfully, the Sheriff wasn't home. Derek used Stiles' keys and got him into
the house, then after a moment to consider it, once he had the boy laid out on
his narrow bed, Derek quickly but carefully undressed him. It was highly
unlikely that Stiles would thank him for this, but Derek instinctively wanted
him to be comfortable while he slept, and he also wanted to get Stiles out of
the clothing that smelled of fear and pain and faintly of death.
He did leave Stiles in his boxers, more for Derek's own sake than for the sake
of Stiles' modesty, and then he found a teeshirt and a pair of pajama bottoms
that smelled of sleep and softness, manipulating Stiles' limp limbs until he
was wearing them.
Then he tucked Stiles under the covers and stood beside the bed, listening to
him breathe.
Stiles had died. He'd been dead. Maybe Deaton had been able to bring him back,
but he had died in Derek's arms. Died.
Somehow Derek found himself on the bed with Stiles, though he settled on top of
the covers instead of under them with Stiles. He hadn't meant to do this. He
just... he just really, really needed to be near Stiles again. To feel his
torso moving as he breathed, to feel his pulse beating under his skin, not just
hear it. Derek needed... he needed.
He gave in to instinct and desire, and he stayed there, holding Stiles as he
slept, inhaling the scent of his living flesh, feeling his heart beat for
hours. Until the Sheriff got home and Derek knew he couldn't stay any longer.
Not with the man's weary tread on the stairs. Not knowing that he checked on
Stiles every night when he got home late; though how Derek knew that was
something of a mystery, even to himself.
Derek left Stiles soundly sleeping, breathing into his pillow, the moon-shaped
nightlight glowing softly, and the window cracked because he couldn't escape
out it and close it at the same time. Not without potentially alerting the
Sheriff anyway.
Once Derek was out of the Stilinski house he started running... and he didn't
stop until the sun had risen and was well on its way into the sky.
It wasn't that he couldn't stop.
It was that he didn't want to stop.
***** Chapter 2 *****
"Stiles has... been really quiet." Isaac spoke haltingly, as though he wasn't
sure he really ought to bring the subject up. "Ever since the night with the
cockatrice."
Derek scowled, knowing that this wasn't the most mature response he could have
evinced, but unable to help himself. To be honest, he'd been avoiding Stiles
since that night in the clinic, almost a week ago. But he kind of thought that
Stiles wanted it that way. He hadn't texted Derek, hadn't visited him, and
Stiles had never been shy about contacting Derek before, so Derek could only
assume this was by choice.
Surely Stiles wouldn't want to have anything to do with the man who had held
him as he'd turned to stone from the inside out, right?
"What part of 'he almost died' are you not getting?" he asked Isaac, raising
his brows. Which was a little better than glaring, even though Erica would have
called his expression 'bitchy' and he knew it.
Isaac looked confused.
"We've all almost died, more than once," he said softly, tilting his head and
staring at Derek in entreaty. As though he was asking his Alpha to explain.
Well, it was true that Derek was the only one outside of Stiles and Deaton who
knew exactly what had happened.
"You're not getting it," Derek bit out, clenching his hands into tight fists,
feeling blunt nails digging into his palms "He was dead. His heart stopped and
he was gone. For at least five minutes. Deaton somehow managed to bring him
back, but Stiles died."
He hadn't really wanted to share that. It wasn't his story to tell. He strongly
suspected Stiles wouldn't want anyone else to know how near a thing it had
been. What had happened in Deaton's clinic, on the floor, had been something
for only Derek and Stiles....
But he couldn't let Isaac -- or the other Betas, or Scott -- go on thinking
Stiles was overreacting to something minor. It was true that they'd all come
close to death before. Derek had been impaled by Peter in Alpha form, and he'd
probably been technically dead for a short period before his body had began
healing itself. But he was a werewolf, he had healed. Stiles was human, he had
a fragile human body, and he'd been dead and petrified for several minutes.
Long enough for Derek to realize how he was going to feel about living in a
world without one Stiles Stilinski in it....
Strangely hollow and lonely, if he was painfully honest about it, though he
preferred not to be honest, to live in denial.
There was a certain sick satisfaction in seeing Isaac staring at him with real
shock on his face. Not because Derek enjoyed freaking his Beta out, of course.
But because now someone else understood the panic and horror Derek had felt
when he'd heard Stiles exhale his last breath.
"Wow," Isaac gaped, blinking rapidly as he processed what Derek had just said.
"Okay, you didn't tell us that part of it."
Derek shrugged, feeling uncomfortable. He didn't really have anything to say to
that. It was true that he hadn't told them, not the next day, not any of the
six and a half days since... and maybe he shouldn't have told Isaac now, but
he'd been carrying the burden on his own long enough.
"Does Scott know?" Isaac asked next, because of course that was where his mind
went. Well, Scott was Stiles' best friend, after all.
Derek shrugged again, more violently this time. "Ask him," he grunted.
"Have you... talked to Stiles?" Isaac spoke hesitantly, but seemed compelled to
utter the words. "Since it happened?"
Derek shook his head briskly and turned away. They were done now.
"You should, Derek," Isaac called after his as he strode out of the room. "He's
too quiet. It's not right. You should... you should talk to him."
Isaac wasn't wrong, Derek thought with what he tried to tell himself was
irritation. He was painfully aware that it was closer to worry than irritation.
Isaac wasn't wrong and Derek should almost definitely go and talk to Stiles
about what had happened. He just wished it wasn't such a hard decision to make.
It had helped Derek, even if only a little, to talk to Isaac about what had
happened. Maybe it would be the same for Stiles..... It was possible he had
told Scott, of course, but Derek kind of thought that if Stiles had told Scott
the true extent of it, Scott would have shared the information with Isaac
already.
Besides, even if Stiles had told Scott, Scott hadn't been there. He wouldn't
know how horrible it had been, listening to Stiles' heart falter and fail. And
Derek would have bet anything that Stiles wouldn't have told Scott how much it
had hurt him when his body had been coming back to life.
Actually, Derek hoped that Stiles didn't remember that part of it; he had been
pretty out of it, after all. But Derek had been there and he remembered and he
couldn't forget. The soft little animal sounds of pain that Stiles had given
vent to, how he had twitched and shuddered in Derek's arms, the way Derek had
tried to comfort him in his pain and distress.....
Derek scowled. He'd been staying away from Stiles as much for Stiles' sake as
his own, but now he was starting to think that it would be better for both of
them if they talked. Isaac really was right, damn it. Derek didn't have to like
it, but he did feel that he had to do it.
And now that his mind was made up, the sooner Derek saw Stiles, the better.
+++
Because he wasn't stupid, Derek waited until the Sheriff was out. He also made
sure that Stiles was home and that there was no sign of Scott or anyone else in
the house. Whether Stiles had told Scott what had happened or not, this was a
conversation for only Derek and Stiles. Whatever they might end up talking
about.
Derek parked a block over but then knocked on the front door. Now definitely
wasn't the time for breaking and entering.
He could hear Stiles in the house, moving slowly toward the front door, and he
remembered what Deaton had said about him being sore and weak. He wondered how
long that had lasted. It had been nearly a week since it had happened, so
surely Stiles was back to normal by now...?
"Derek?"
"Stiles," he said uncomfortably, shifting where he was standing, his eyes
greedily soaking in the sight of Stiles framed in the open doorway. He
looked... like Stiles. Nothing seemed irrevocably different. There were shadows
under his eyes that were a bit darker than usual, and his cheekbones were
worrisomely stark, but he'd looked this exhausted before. More than once, in
fact.
Stiles blinked a couple of times, then his lips stretched in a smile that was
not much of a smile at all. "Do you wanna come in?" he asked, taking a step
back.
"That's why I'm here," Derek grunted, shoving his hands in his jacket pockets.
Yeah, it was rude of him, but he didn't need to be gracious with Stiles.
He followed Stiles into the kitchen, watching him walk. He seemed to be
completely recovered, as far as Derek could tell. He smelled like he always
had. His heartbeat was strong and steady. It was as though nothing had
happened... except, as Isaac had said, he was quiet.
"You want a soda?" Stiles asked, opening the fridge and peering over his
shoulder at Derek with his brows raised. He wasn't as animated as he often was,
but he wasn't flat. He just looked... tired. "Coffee? Water?"
Derek considered it a moment, whether a drink would help the stiff discomfort
between them, but after a moment he shook his head. He wasn't thirsty.
Stiles stared at him a couple of heartbeats longer, then quirked a small grin
that looked a little more real and shrugged. "Suit yourself," he said, grabbing
a can and closing the fridge. "Do you wanna go up to my room?"
Derek nodded. So far he wasn't doing an incredibly good job of talking to
Stiles, he was well aware. But this wasn't something he could just dive into.
"Hey, remember when you died in my arms?" No. He was here to talk to Stiles,
but he was also here in case Stiles needed to talk to him, and Stiles was
talking now. Which was more than he'd been doing lately at school, according to
Isaac.
Stiles was silent, though, as he led Derek upstairs. He was moving freely, but
Derek could easily recall the way his limbs had been heavy and unmoving. It
made him shiver, even though Stiles was better now.
"So," Stiles said, once he'd waved Derek toward his desk chair and seated
himself on the end of his bed, handling his soda with both hands but not moving
to open the can. "Here we are." He took a deep breath. "Thank you. For, you
know. Getting me to Deaton's and saving my life."
He stared at Derek as he spoke, his eyes bright and clear. Nothing like the
filmy marbles they'd been when the cockatrice's poison had been petrifying him
internally. His expression was guarded, but his lips were soft, and he looked
alive.
"You called me for help," Derek said roughly, not sure what he was going to say
until he said it. "I helped."
Stiles nodded.
"I was too late," Derek continued, swallowing painfully and clenching his hands
on his thighs. "You died. Before Deaton could do anything, you died. You were
dead. He brought you back." It was as though the words had been forced out of
him, as though he wanted Stiles to know the entirety of the horror that had
befallen him. As though Stiles might be unaware.
"Yeah." Stiles smiled at him, his fixed gaze going a bit distant. "I actually
got him a flower arrangement for that. Stupid, but... what do you get the man
who saved your life?" His eyes sharpened and pinned Derek in place. "What
should I get you in thanks, Derek?"
"You're alive," Derek said, feeling as though his lips were numb. "That's all
that matters."
Stiles blinked at him in surprise, long lashes flickering over clear brown
eyes, those red lips hanging open. "Oh. Okay."
Neither of them followed this bold declaration up with anything, and they sat
there in moderately awkward silence for nearly two minutes. Derek wondered
whether Stiles would have been able to maintain that before he'd died. It
wasn't exactly a comfortable thought.
He wanted to ask Stiles if he was okay. He wanted to ask how much he
remembered. He wanted to go and sit next to Stiles and pull him close and just
breathe in the normal, everyday scent of him. He couldn't do any of these
things; most especially not that last.
"Thank you," Stiles said again, staring at Derek as though he was waiting for
something. His long, lean fingers were turning the soda can around and around,
trailing slick through the condensation beading on the surface, and his face
was warm with blood. "Not just for driving me to Deaton. You..." he licked his
lips, "You stayed. While I was turning to stone. And you... Deaton said you
took me home... after?"
Derek nodded but didn't reply verbally because he didn't know that to say. He
had come here to find out how much Stiles remembered, but now that they were
talking about it he felt incredibly uncomfortable.
"Did you...." Stiles' brow wrinkled in a deep frown, one that curved his lips
down at the corners and stretched the skin over his cheekbones and jaw. "You
promised that you'd look out for my Dad... once I was gone... didn't you?"
Derek nodded jerkily, wishing he had accepted the offer of a soda, because then
he could be doing something with his hands other than digging his nails into
his thighs.
"I did," he confirmed. He didn't like remembering those last horrible moments,
as Stiles had stopped breathing in his arms. And then the minutes that
followed, when Stiles had continued to not breathe.
"Why?" Stiles looked at him with bright, inquisitive eyes.
He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, Stiles' chair creaking under his weight.
"You were dying, Stiles."
Stiles stared at him steadily. "So you didn't really mean it?" he asked
curiously. There was no judgment in his tone, but Derek bristled anyway.
"No. I meant it," he scowled.
"You...." Stiles' mouth was open again, and he looked honestly confounded. "But
why?"
"Because you asked me to."
It was as simple as that, honestly, but this didn't seem to be the reply Stiles
had been expecting. The soda can slipped out of Stiles' fingers and hit the
carpeted floor with a thunk that reminded Derek a little too much of Stiles'
petrified hand striking the floor of Deaton's examination room, but he held
onto his response, simply watching quietly as Stiles cursed and bent to pick
the can up, seeming flustered.
"Since when have you ever done anything I've asked?" Stiles wanted to know,
sounding confused rather than combative.
"Since you died," Derek cracked out, his brows descending. It seemed wrong to
be glaring at Stiles for having died, but Derek couldn't help the expression.
Stiles hunched into himself a little, then set the soda can aside on his
bedcovers and leaned forward, elbows planted on his thighs. He was wearing a
red plaid and the shade reflected onto his face, giving it even more color.
Which was only a good thing when the last time Derek had seen him he'd been
pale and still as death.
"I'm alive now," Stiles offered, spreading his hands. "Thanks to you."
Derek nodded. He didn't really have anything else to say. Stiles was alive and
it was as much thanks to Derek as Deaton, and vice versa. He wasn't really
comfortable with Stiles thanking him, but it would have been worse to reject
his gratitude.
"I'm glad I called you," Stiles said, so softly that Derek almost didn't hear
him. "I'm glad you came."
"Yeah." Derek ducked his head. Then something occurred to him, something that
had him frowning faintly and raising his head. "What were you doing out there
anyway?"
Stiles shifted where he sat and looked a little embarrassed. "I just... uh...
wanted to know what was going on. I didn't.... No one told me it was a
cockatrice. Deaton told me later, when I took him the flower arrangement, how
dangerous that thing was, but at the time I had no idea."
Derek sat and digested that for a moment. "Did you know we were out there
hunting it?"
Stiles shook his head. "No. I was just curious about what was killing the
animals."
"So you thought driving out to the woods where animals were dying was a good
idea?" Derek asked incredulously, brows rising. He knew that Stiles lacked good
sense at times -- that was why Scott was a werewolf now, after all -- but when
dead rabbits and deer were turning up, shouldn't that be a clear warning to
stay out of the Preserve?
Stiles shrugged uncomfortably. "Well.... It was only animals that were dying.
Not people...."
"Not yet," Derek ground out, feeling the panic swell inside him all over again;
not wild, just like an aching echo, a reminder of what had happened to Stiles
and how it had made Derek feel. "You came out of the encounter pretty dead,
Stiles," he barked, and he knew he sounded pissed off, but Stiles had died.
Stiles' mouth turned down at the corners, but he seemed more sheepish than
defensive over the whole thing. "But you were there to take me to Deaton's. And
he knew how to fix me," he offered, spreading his hands wide.
Derek felt a sudden stab of cold when he realized that Stiles had called him
for help when he hadn't even known Derek had been nearby. What if he'd been at
home or in town or something? Stiles would have died before Derek could have
gotten there! And Derek strongly suspected that the longer Stiles had remained
petrified, the less likely it would have been that Deaton would have been able
to bring him back.
"Why didn't you call someone else?" he asked urgently, because now that he knew
Stiles hadn't known he was nearby, this was a very pertinent question.
Stiles bit his lip. "My hands were barely working," he replied awkwardly. "And
you were the one I happened to hit on speed dial."
Stiles was lying. He was lying and Derek wanted to know why, but he knew he'd
never get a straight answer if he just asked outright.
"I'm sorry," Derek gruffed out, nails digging into his jeans again.
"For... helping me?" Stiles hazarded, his incredulous eyebrow quirk and the
tone of his voice making it clear he didn't actually think that had been what
Derek had meant.
Derek shook his head, trying to order his thoughts, anticipating Stiles' next
question.
"Then what the heck are you sorry for?"
Derek flexed his fingers, listening to his blunt nails catching in the denim.
At least they weren't claws, though this entire conversation was making him
feel very defensive.
"It shouldn't have been me there," he forced out. "It should have been Scott.
Or maybe...."
Stiles straightened, glaring at him. "If you say my Dad I'm going to come over
there and punch you in the face," he snapped. "He already had to watch my Mom
die. He didn't need to see--"
He broke off and shook his head, his throat working tensely. Derek felt bad and
he wanted to take the words back or maybe say something else, but before he
could think of what, Stiles continued.
"If Scott had been there, it would have been all about him. He was losing his
best friend. He couldn't save me. You held me and you made it about me, Derek.
That was what I needed."
Derek was silent for a long moment, working his way through this startling
declaration. "It felt like it was about me," he offered weakly.
Stiles smiled, an actual real smile, curving his lips softly. Derek didn't
think he'd ever seen a real smile on Stiles' face before; at least not aimed at
him.
"I doubt that," Stiles said, standing and approaching Derek, slowly, as though
he was afraid he might startle him or something. "But even if that's true, you
didn't act that way. You... you comforted me, Derek. I was scared and it was
cold. It hurt. I could feel my body turning to stone, and I couldn't see
anymore. And you could have just dumped me on Deaton and left, but you--"
"No!" Derek snapped, rising and standing facing Stiles where he'd frozen in the
middle of his bedroom. He sucked in a deep breath and continued, struggling for
a calm that he didn't feel. "I couldn't just leave you there, Stiles. You were
dying. You needed.... You needed someone there."
Stiles relaxed a little, taking a step forward and reaching a hand tentatively
toward Derek. "That's the thing," he said, and Derek allowed Stiles to clasp
his upper arm lightly through the leather of his jacket. "You stayed because it
was the right thing to do. No one else would have done that, not for that
reason. And you made me feel safe, even though I was dying. You told me to hold
on, and when I couldn't, you set my mind at ease about my Dad. You were
everything I needed you to be, Derek. You're the one person I trust to watch
over me while I die."
Derek's hair bristled, and he wasn't sure whether it was because Stiles had so
casually mentioned dying, or if it was his use of the word "trust".
"You don't trust me," he growled, yanking his arm away. But he didn't leave the
room. He was too weak to do that, even though it was what he probably should
do. It was too good to see Stiles, talking and breathing and alive. Even if
what he was saying was making Derek feel very uncomfortable.
"I do, actually," Stiles corrected, twining his hands together before his chest
and looking at Derek earnestly. "You can deny it if you want, but you can't
tell me how I feel. Something about dying in someone's arms lends clarity to a
few things."
Derek whined -- he actually whined, and he was humiliated by that sound, but it
was too late to retrieve it -- when Stiles mentioned his death again.
Without thinking about why it was a very bad idea, he reached forward and
grabbed at Stiles, dragging him into his arms and burying his face in the curve
of his neck. Stiles smelled exactly like he was supposed to. Clean skin, faint
salty perspiration, lingering deodorant, traces of his father, Scott, and
Isaac, a hint of pineapple for some reason... but mostly he just smelled alive.
Derek might have been more horrified by what he'd just done if Stiles' arms
hadn't come around him in return, squeezing him just as tightly. His cheekbone
was hard and pointed against Derek's ear, and his breathing had picked up a
little, but he seemed almost to become more settled, held close against Derek's
chest, holding him in return.
They stood there for almost a full minute, and Derek kind of figured that
neither of them knew how to break the moment. Neither of them really wanted to,
maybe.
It was Stiles who finally spoke, which didn't surprise Derek, even though Isaac
had said he had been more quiet lately, and Derek had proven the truth of this
during his visit today.
"Hugging. We're hugging," he said, speaking into Derek's shoulder. Derek had
his nose pressed into the flesh of Stiles' neck, feeling his pulse beating
through the thin skin, allowing the scent of Stiles to wash over his senses and
calm him.
"This isn't hugging," Derek growled, raising his head and loosening his arms as
he took a step back. Stiles released him reluctantly, his fingers grasping
uselessly at the leather of Derek's jacket before his hands fell away entirely,
arms hanging at his sides.
"What was it then, dude?" Stiles asked, brows arching in query over his bright
eyes. His cheeks were a little flushed, but he didn't look embarrassed. Maybe a
little shy, and it made Derek want to tug him in close again and sniff him all
over. Maybe rub the pad of his thumb over those parted red lips....
"I was holding you," Derek said gruffly, trying to justify it as much to
himself as to Stiles. "The way I did that night. And you were holding me back,
the same way. Returning the favor."
"Oh." Stiles blinked, thick lashes fluttering and pink lips curling up at the
corners. "All right, then. Can we... can we try that again? I liked it. But
maybe without the jacket this time?"
Derek quirked a brow eloquently, and the flush pinking Stiles' cheeks darkened
into a full-on blush.
"Or not," he hastily backpedalled. Literally, as he took two steps back away
from Derek. "I just.... We sort of shared a moment. You know. Me dying and you
being there. It was something that no one else knows about, really. Deaton was
there, but he wasn't there."
Stiles was trying hard to keep his tone light, as though what he was saying
wasn't hugely important, but Derek heard what he was saying and he understood.
He understood completely, and it hurt him to know that Stiles had been as
affected by what had happened as he had been.
Instead of speaking, he shrugged out of his jacket. "Take that shirt off," he
instructed, nodding at the red plaid Stiles was wearing. He could see from the
unbuttoned collar that Stiles had a teeshirt on underneath, so it wasn't too
unreasonable an order.
Stiles gaped at him a moment, but when Derek hung his jacket over the chair
he'd been sitting on and toed off his shoes, his eyes got wide and he fumbled
with his buttons. "Okay. Just... What...?"
Derek didn't reply to what was, after all, an almost completely incoherent
query. Instead, he went and grabbed the soda Stiles had discarded on the bed
and set it on his dresser.
"Did you want that?" Stiles asked, peeling off his shirt and tossing it easily
over top of Derek's jacket, as though this action was something that didn't
matter, that wouldn't mingle their scents together. "You can have it. Or I can
get you a cold one."
"If I wanted it, would I have set it down?" Derek asked pointedly.
Stiles stared at him blankly.
Derek restrained an exasperated sigh. "Come here," he instructed, reaching a
hand out, fingers curling easily in toward his palm.
Honestly, he almost rethought his resolve when Stiles' eyes rounded and he
looked all of twelve years old for a moment.... But then Derek took further
note of the stark lines of Stiles' face, the way he'd begun growing into the
young man he was on the verge of being, the shadows still evident beneath his
eyes, the breadth of his shoulders under the thin material of his teeshirt, and
instead of changing his mind he reached out and took hold of Stiles, dragging
him into his arms again. Not for a hug, but to hold him close as he got them
both settled down on the bed.
It was narrow, barely a twin, but Derek clasped Stiles close to him, sharing
space.
"Derek, what--?" Stiles squeaked, and it would have been amusing any other
time, but now that he had Stiles in his arms, literally and legitimately, Derek
couldn't think of anything other than the way it had felt to hold Stiles while
the life ebbed out of his body.
"This is... unexpected," Stiles said into Derek's collarbone, fingers twitching
in the material of Derek's shirt, right over his beating heart.
"Stiles, you died," Derek said softly, daring to reach up and thread his
fingers through Stiles' hair, palming the back of his skull. He didn't move his
hand, just held on, but it felt right. He ached to say the things that were in
his heart. You died and I felt it happen. You died in my arms. I thought I was
going to have to live the rest of my life without ever hearing your voice
again. I've lost so much; I didn't want to lose that as well. I didn't want to
lose you.
He couldn't speak the words, though. They would render him too vulnerable, show
too much of his carefully guarded self. Maybe Stiles was telling the truth when
he said that he trusted Derek, but that didn't mean that Derek trusted Stiles
in return, or that he should.
"You died, you felt yourself die, and it hurt when you came back to life," he
did say, because that was about Stiles, not about Derek. "Are you okay?"
Stiles was silent, and from the tension in his body Derek knew that he'd hit a
nerve. He hadn't meant to. But it was better to focus on what Stiles had gone
through than what Derek had experienced.
"It was like... everything inside me was getting cold and heavy," Stiles
murmured into Derek's shirt front after a few moments had slipped over them in
tense silence. "I think I remember saying it hurt... but it didn't really.
Well, I mean, it did hurt, a lot, back when you first found me and put me in my
Jeep. But it didn't really hurt anymore by the time we got to Deaton's. It was
cold and it was dark after my eyes stopped working. And my heart just got
slower and slower and my lungs weren't working right, and I was... I was
scared. It still felt like it hurt, even once it stopped actually hurting."
Derek nodded, even though Stiles probably couldn't tell since his face was
still buried in Derek's shirt.
Stiles let out a weak little chuckle. "You must think I'm such a baby, whining
about this when I'm fine now," he whispered, curling closer to Derek like he
was trying to hide in his chest.
"I think you're brave," Derek told him seriously, "To be willing to talk about
it." He never would have said the things Stiles was saying, not even to members
of his family before they had died. It wasn't a failing in Stiles. It was a
strength. Stupid as hell, but... well, Stiles trusted Derek, and something in
Derek kind of wanted to be worthy of that trust.
Stiles let out a little huff that Derek couldn't figure out, not without seeing
his face. "It was scary, but you made it better. I felt like I was all alone,
but then you... you touched me, and you held me. And even though everything was
getting harder and harder, I felt safe. I knew you couldn't save me, but I
wasn't alone and you talked to me and you promised to take care of my Dad...."
Derek held Stiles close as he stopped talking. He seemed to have run out of
words, and Derek didn't have anything to say. Not really. He could hold Stiles
now, though, the way he had held him that awful night a week ago.
For some reason it just felt right.
Of course, someone had to go and spoil it. Derek just couldn't quite believe
that it was him, not Stiles.
"Do you remember... anything... after Deaton brought you back?"
Once he'd haltingly asked this question, uncertain why he had uttered it but
eager to hear the answer, silence fell over them again, but less easy, less
companionable than it had been before he had asked.
"Not really," Stiles replied, shifting restlessly against him, pressing his
head back against Derek's cupping hand in order to look up at him. Derek
shifted his hand down to rest on Stiles' shoulder and stared in the direction
of the window, not meeting Stiles' eyes. "I think I remember pain, a lot of
pain. But mostly I remember waking up alone in my bed."
Derek curled his fingers over Stiles' shoulder, unsure. Maybe he shouldn't be
here, holding Stiles on the boy's bed. But it had seemed like the right thing
to do at the time....
"It wasn't fun," Stiles continued, and he was still looking at Derek, but Derek
wouldn't, couldn't look back. "I ached all over, like I'd been kicked around by
a couple of horses. It hurt to move and I was so tired, even though I'd just
woken up. I told my Dad I thought I had the flu, but it was about a hundred
times worse than that." Stiles let out a little chuckle. "Or, well, at least
twice as bad."
"Deaton said you'd be sore and weak," Derek offered, glancing quickly down at
Stiles but just as quickly moving his gaze away again.
"It kind of sucked," Stiles told him, fingers tightening in his shirt. "Waking
up alone and in pain. I mean, it was better than being dead. And I'm still glad
that you stayed with me in the clinic... before. But I was kind of hoping...."
"I did stay," Derek blurted, though he hadn't meant to tell Stiles. "After I
took you home. I stayed with you until I heard your father coming in. But then
when he came to check on you... I had to leave."
Stiles was quiet.
"I did stay. Even though you were asleep." Derek didn't know why he felt the
need to repeat himself -- he usually didn't -- but he wanted to make sure that
Stiles understood and accepted the truth, that Derek had stayed. For Stiles.
Well, and for himself, but Stiles didn't need to know that part of it.
"Okay," Stiles said softly. "It's okay. I just...."
"I didn't think you'd want to see me," Derek offered with wrenching honesty.
"The next day, I mean. After what happened, I didn't think you'd want...."
"It's fine," Stiles hurried to assure him, though there was a slight jump to
his pulse that gave it away as a partial untruth. "I mean, you probably didn't
want to be reminded about what happened. It couldn't have been pleasant."
It would have been lying to say it had been the worst experience of Derek's
life. There had been so many. Finding out his family had all been burned alive.
Finding out he was responsible for that happening. Losing Laura. Having to kill
his last remaining family member after discovering he'd been the one to kill
Laura. There were so many worse experiences to choose from.
But holding Stiles while he had died had probably been the worst thing that had
happened to Derek that hadn't involved his family somehow. And it was
definitely in the top tier of the worst things that he'd lived through.
"I didn't think you would want to be reminded... of dying," he said flatly.
Because this wasn't about Derek, this was about Stiles. Stiles was the one who
had died. Derek had just been the one who had held him and tried to comfort him
in his final moments.
Stiles was staring up at him with an unreadable look on his face, and it struck
Derek like a hammer to the chest that they were laying on Stiles' bed together,
and maybe this wasn't the best place for either of them to be. But it had felt
right, and it still... it still felt right, Derek thought. Somehow.
"It wasn't the dying that was the problem," Stiles murmured, his eyes fixed on
Derek's face, dark and bright and so much better than when they had been pale,
milky marbles. "It was being alone. And thanks to you, I didn't have to be
alone. I don't..." he licked his lips, pink tongue flickering over red swells,
"I mean, I don't want to sound like I think I'm entitled to your attention. I'm
just glad you were there and took care of me while...."
"I thought," Derek said when Stiles let that sentence trail away unfinished,
thankfully. "I mean, you've never been shy about.... I thought that when you
didn't text me or anything, that you were just as happy not to hear from me."
He felt a little bad putting it back on Stiles like that, but there were two of
them involved, and Derek had already gone above and beyond on that night a week
ago, when the cockatrice had brushed up against Stiles' leg. They both knew it.
Stiles nodded, and he didn't seem offended by anything Derek had said. "I kind
of thought the same, only in reverse. I mean, it must have kinda sucked,
watching me bite it."
Derek shivered at the reminder, as well as the casual, easy way Stiles spoke
about his death. Of course, it was far more personal than Stiles probably
realized.... But, on the other hand, Derek himself hadn't realized how much he
had actually cared until it had been too late and Stiles had been dead.
Without Derek willing it, his arms tightened. Stiles let out a small squeak as
Derek reeled him in against his chest. It was probably wrong, but it felt
right. His instincts was to hold Stiles tightly and never let go. Maybe in a
moment Stiles would begin to struggle and Derek would have to let him go, but
right now he wanted, he needed to keep him close.
Stiles didn't fight it, though. He melted into Derek's torso, arm hesitantly
sliding around Derek and his hand coming to rest lightly over the tattoo etched
in his skin, through the thin material of his shirt. Stiles was warm and alive
and he was solid in Derek's arms. Solid but giving, the way flesh was supposed
to feel, not hard the way he had been when he had been petrifying from the
inside outward.
"I'm sorry," Stiles said quietly, the words breaking heated and moist over the
skin of Derek's neck, right at the collar of his shirt. "For dying in your
arms, I mean. But I'm really glad you were there. And you... I don't know if it
matters, but you... did everything right."
Derek was silent, spreading his own hand wide over the taut muscles of Stiles'
back, feeling the beating of his heart, sinking into the sound and sensation.
They both calmed, and Stiles slowly relaxed against him when Derek didn't
evince any negative reaction to either his words or his touch.
"It matters," Derek breathed. He hadn't meant to say it, but he didn't really
regret the words once they were out. He probably should have but he didn't.
Stiles was silent in response, and Derek was glad. He couldn't think of
anything else they needed to say, and there was comfort enough for both of
them, lying here on Stiles' bed, holding each other.
Like the night that Stiles had died and come back to life, Derek stayed until
he heard the Sheriff arriving, this time at a considerably earlier hour, before
the Stilinski dinner hour. This time when Derek left, though, Stiles was awake
and aware.
Derek knew that Stiles was watching out his window as he walked away from the
house and headed for his car, but he didn't turn around. He wanted to, but he
didn't.
And this time he headed straight home, but there was still that itch under his
skin that had gotten him running the night Stiles had died. It hadn't gone
away, even though he'd seen with his own eyes that Stiles was alive and doing
all right. Derek wasn't sure whether he'd expected it to do so or not, in all
honesty, and he didn't know how to deal with it. So he did nothing.
It wasn't the best response, he was sure, but it was the only one that felt
safe to him.
Without Stiles present, Derek just... he didn't really know what to do.
***** Chapter 3 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
"Derek, you jerk!"
Just the day before Derek had been knocking on the door to the Stilinski house,
but Stiles evidently didn't feel the need to stand on the same ceremony as he
banged into Derek's loft with a loud shout and an overabundance of attitude.
Lucky for him the door had been unlocked, because unlike Derek at the clinic a
week ago, it was unlikely he'd have been able to kick it open.
"What?" Derek paused where he was folding shirts and dropping them on the back
of the sofa, staring at his home invader with a level of surprise that he was
feeling too strongly to disguise.
Stiles glared at him, though he did close the door carefully behind himself
rather than slamming it.
"You told Isaac!" Stiles accused, stalking toward the sofa and Derek. "Who told
Scott, who then proceeded to completely freak out on me!"
Derek inhaled as Stiles came to a stop on the other side of the sofa and waved
his arms about in emphasis. Stiles must have come right over, because he
smelled of school. He also smelled very strongly of Scott, and a little less
strongly of Isaac.
Derek's brows rose. He hadn't realized that Isaac would actually care that
Stiles had been temporarily dead. He'd anticipated that Isaac would tell Scott,
of course, and he'd expected that Scott would be upset, but he wouldn't be
smelling Isaac on Stiles if he hadn't touched him at some point, possibly
embracing him, and that was a little surprising.
"What are you yelling at me for?" he asked gruffly, frowning down at the shirt
in his hands. He hated doing laundry but he did like having clean clothes. It
was an eternal annoyance, and yet another reminder that he was an adult who had
to make sure to do his own chores. "Did you think Scott wouldn't be upset? Do
you think he shouldn't be upset?"
Stiles was scowling at him, Derek could see from the corner of his eye as he
continued quietly folding laundry. He was, shock of shocks, wearing a plaid
over top of a slogan teeshirt. Something deep inside of Derek was bristling
that Stiles smelled so strongly of Scott -- of someone who wasn't Derek -- but
he knew to ignore this part of himself, because he had absolutely zero claim
over any part of Stiles.
Aside from the part of Stiles that had been in Derek's arms when he had died
the week before....
"Dude, it wasn't your place to go telling tales," Stiles sputtered, folding his
arms and glaring harder. Derek looked at him and wanted to smile because Stiles
looked like nothing more than a disgruntled puppy, but he knew better than
that. Stiles was already pissed off enough.
"I just told Isaac about how you nearly died," he offered, setting down the
shirt he was holding and folding his own arms to match Stiles' stance.
"No," Stiles shot out, and his cheeks were flushed and he'd never looked so
alive, and Derek wanted to... wanted to... well, he wasn't sure, but sweeping
Stiles into his arms and feeling all that vibrant life right up against his
chest was definitely a part of his desire.
"No," Stiles continued angrily. "You told Isaac that I did die. Not that I
nearly died."
Derek scowled, not liking the reminder. "I only told him the truth," he said
stiffly, trying to figure out why Stiles was so angry at him. "He was worried
about you and I told him what happened."
Stiles' face went soft, then hardened, then twisted in an expression of
outrage. "And did it ever occur to you," he asked dangerously, "That I didn't
want anyone to know what really happened?"
Derek stared at him blankly, and Stiles huffed, unfolding his arms and waving
his hands around. It was highly likely that Derek shouldn't have been
distracted by how long and graceful Stiles' fingers were when the two of them
were, evidently, in the middle of a fight; even if Derek didn't understand why
they were fighting.
"That was...." Stiles' tongue flickered lightning-quick to wet his lips, and he
wasn't glaring anymore, but he didn't look any less unhappy. "That was
something for just us, Derek. I didn't.... No one else needed to know. Except,
you know, for Deaton. But he isn't going to go talking about it."
Derek huffed, feeling enlightened and yet even more confused, all at the same
time.
"I didn't," he shook his head. "Stiles, I didn't go into any detail. I just
told Isaac that you were dead for maybe about five minutes before Deaton
brought you back. No more than that, I swear."
Stiles blinked rapidly, and his face twisted again. "Wow, really? Five
minutes?" He fixed Derek with a sharp stare. "You didn't tell me that. So you
told Isaac something you didn't tell me!"
Derek froze. Stiles sounded... upset... but not furious? He sensed that he was
going to have to tread delicately here, but he had no idea how to do so.
"I didn't mean to...." He licked his own lips, cursing himself for showing
weakness, but it was Stiles. Stiles, who fixated on his mouth for a moment,
then went right back to meeting his eyes like a challenge... or maybe a plea.
"It wasn't that I told Isaac something I didn't tell you. I mean, not
deliberately. But you were there. We were both there. I didn't.... You were
dead and I didn't think it was important to tell you how long? I mean...."
He wasn't even sure any longer what he meant. He wasn't sure why Stiles was
pissed at him. And he felt an overwhelming wave of relief as Stiles' face
shifted into a thoughtful expression, anger seemingly sliding away.
"Derek." Stiles tilted his head. "Derek, why did you tell Isaac what happened?"
Derek grunted, picking up a shirt and unfolding it, shaking it out, then
folding it again just to have something to do with his hands.
"He wasn't taking the situation seriously enough," he replied honestly, knowing
he sounded grouchy but unable to help it. He didn't know why he was being
honest, but something in the clear gleam of Stiles' eyes demanded it. "I
couldn't let.... He needed to know that you were being quiet because you
literally died, not just because you'd had a near-death experience. We have
those all the time."
He tacked on that last, echoing Isaac's words, because it was a sad fact. And
because what had happened to Stiles had been so, so much worse.
Stiles looked bemused. "Aw, you were defending my honor," he cooed, and if he'd
been mocking him, Derek would have left the room right then even though it was
his home... but he wasn't. Stiles looked strangely fascinated instead. "Okay, I
forgive you."
"How generous of you," Derek drawled dryly.
"Even though Scott completely flipped his shit," Stiles continued, and now his
lips were curling up in a wide grin, and it was an improvement on the anger,
but Derek had even less idea how to handle it.
So he just shrugged uncomfortably.
Stiles drew in a deep breath and wandered around the sofa, fingertips dragging
over the shirts Derek had draped along its back. "I was quiet," he told Derek,
"Because I was sore. It hurt to move. It hurt to even exist. And then once that
faded, I was quiet because I was processing. Dying isn't something that you
just bounce back from, you know? I was thinking... thinking about my Dad... and
how he'd have felt. Even though you promised to take care of him, he'd have
been devastated."
Derek nodded as Stiles shivered. He'd had the same thoughts and they hadn't
been pleasant ones, even though the Sheriff wasn't his father.
Stiles came to stand beside Derek, and without his willing it, Derek turned
toward him. He felt off-balance and wanted to face the threat. Only... Stiles
wasn't a threat, was he? So why, then, did Derek feel as though he was under
attack?
"Then I was quiet because I was thinking about... you," Stiles confessed,
softly but not shyly. He peered at Derek from under long lashes, and there was
something unknown and frightening in his gaze. Derek was worried but he
couldn't look away.
"Me?" he asked, when Stiles left it hanging there.
Stiles nodded. "Yeah, I.... You saved me. You took me to Deaton and you stayed
and you held me and you told me you'd take care of my Dad. You didn't leave me
while I died. And then I found out that you stayed with me once I was alive
again, even if I wasn't conscious for it, and you just told me that you really
would have tried to look after my Dad. You... you made everything all right,
and you meant it."
Derek swallowed tightly, because it was true. He'd meant what he'd done. He'd
meant what he'd said, all of it, and he didn't even know why.
As though he'd read Derek's mind, Stiles continued. "I was quiet because I was
trying to figure out why. Why you were willing to... to help me, to hold me, to
reassure me...."
Derek shrugged, hunching uncomfortably into himself. "I...."
"Then I figured it out." Stiles gave him a perky look, still smiling, brows
rising.
Derek scowled in query.
"You're a good person," Stiles whispered, leaning in as though it was a secret
he was sharing, something he didn't want the world to know. He peered at Derek
with bright eyes, laughing but not laughing at Derek; he clearly meant what he
was saying even though he was speaking lightly. His teeth flashed in a wide
grin as he continued, "I'm not saying you're not the badass you want the world
to think you are. But you're also a nice guy, Derek."
Derek was already shaking his head.
"Yes, you are," Stiles pushed, and he wasn't smiling anymore, but the edges of
his lips were still faintly curled. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone."
If there was anything Derek was not, it was a good person. But it was
surprisingly nice to hear that Stiles thought he was one. It made Derek want to
avoid disappointing Stiles, made him want to be good for Stiles.
But in the end Derek knew he would only end up disappointing anyone who
believed in him. So he couldn't let Stiles go on thinking something that wasn't
true.
"I'm not a good person," he stated flatly. "I wouldn't have done what I did for
just anyone. I did it for you because you matter."
The last three words came out in a mumble, because he realized as he spoke them
that they were actually worse than what he was trying to deny.
"I do?" Now Stiles was staring at Derek with his mouth hanging open.
Derek wasn't going to deny what he had just said, but he wasn't going to
confirm it either. Stiles had heard him, clearly. He didn't feel the need to
repeat something he kind of wished he hadn't said in the first place.
Deciding that they were done talking, Derek gathered up his clean clothes off
the back of the sofa, piling them in his arms, then carrying them over to the
box near his bed that he used in lieu of a dresser.
Stiles, predictably enough, followed him.
"Derek."
He dumped his clothes in the box, then turned to give Stiles the most
expressionless stare he could manage. He was painfully aware that it probably
wasn't very expressionless. His eyebrows were stern, he was pretty sure, but
the rest of his face was a total loss.
"Derek," Stiles repeated, eyes shining and features animated, looking like his
old self for the first time since Derek had found him lying next to his Jeep in
a jumble of loose limbs. "Hey, you know, I almost died a virgin. Do you know
how much that sucks?"
"I don't...." Derek cleared his throat, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to
the other, as though he might begin running at any moment. He wasn't sure why
they were suddenly talking about this, why Stiles thought it was relevant.
"What, do you expect me to do something about it?" he found himself asking,
unable to ward off the pending disaster.
Stiles took a step and half closer to Derek, and his eyes were dark and warm
beneath heavy lids. Derek had to battle against the very real urge to retreat.
In no large part because taking a single step backwards would have him falling
down onto his bed, and that would have given Stiles the completely wrong
impression. But also because he was the Alpha and he shouldn't be intimidated
by a sixteen year old virgin.
"Not expect, no," Stiles said archly. "But if you're offering...."
Stiles took that last half step and there he was, right in Derek's personal
space. It wasn't the first time, obviously. There had been the day before when
they had held one another in Stiles' bedroom, while standing and then while
lying on the bed. And previous to that, well, there'd been the first time, when
Derek had pushed Stiles up against his door and threatened him while his father
was practically in the hall. There had been the two hours in the pool, there'd
been those few minutes on the floor of the Police Station....
For all Derek didn't often choose to touch Stiles, they'd been close like this
before. Usually in extremis, it was true. And never before with the previously
unspoken matter of Stiles' virginity spoken of and put out there as something
that Derek might have anything to do with....
Stiles should have been shy or anxious, Derek thought. Instead he was
confident, bold, his chin raised and his eyes flickering between Derek's eyes
and his mouth, the warm, rich smell of his growing arousal leaving Derek no
room for mistaking his intent.
Derek felt an emotion approaching terror fill him as he came to realize that
while he had been wallowing in denial, Stiles had been working all of this out
in that overly-sharp brain of his.
"You're not...." He dragged in a long, slow breath, realizing too late that he
was inhaling the heady smell of Stiles' lust. Not that he hadn't already picked
up on the meaning behind Stiles' words -- Stiles wasn't exactly being subtle -
- but this was something that was going to affect his own judgment and he
damned well knew it.
It wasn't as though Derek had never thought about it before. Stiles was... he
was Stiles. He was attractive even if he didn't know how to use his features to
his best advantage. He was brave and strong and loyal to a fault. He had his
flaws, of course, everyone did, but he had more good points than bad, and he
made Derek... he made him want, even though Derek had tried to bury those
desires down where they would never see the light of day.
It was day now, and Stiles was here, and he was pushing Derek to face his
hidden desires. It wasn't.... It wasn't fair.
"Derek." Stiles was so close that their scents were mingling, and Derek
realized that Stiles wasn't the only one who was aroused. "Derek, you said I
mattered. You... you meant it, right?"
He couldn't deny it now, but he couldn't be the one to make the first move. Or,
well, in this case, the second or third. Since Stiles had made his feelings
known and put himself out there on the line.
Because... Stiles was only sixteen. He was the son of the town Sheriff. He was
human, and he was overly inclined to throw himself in the path of danger for
those he cared about regardless of that last fact. Getting involved with him
wouldn't be the worst thing Derek could do -- no, that would have been giving
Kate Argent the means to destroy almost his entire family -- but it might well
be the worst thing he could do for Stiles.
Derek was weak. He wasn't going to be able to push Stiles away. But he couldn't
draw him in, either. The day before they had held one another, but it had been
for comfort. This was... this was something completely different.
"You probably already know this," Stiles breathed, reaching up and easily,
lazily draping his arms around Derek's neck, linking his hands behind his head,
his mouth inches from Derek's, "What with the whole trusting you thing, but you
matter to me too."
Then he saved Derek the trouble of figuring out what to say in reply to this as
he closed the scant space between their faces and plastered his lips against
Derek's.
It was clear within half a heartbeat that Stiles wasn't anything approaching an
expert at kissing. Derek was surprisingly okay with that. Or maybe not so
surprising, if the fact that Stiles was kissing him wasn't surprising enough.
The idea that Stiles hadn't kissed many other people -- maybe any other people?
-- made the possessive side of Derek flare, filled him with a certain dark joy
over the fact that he was getting this, that Stiles was giving this to him.
Derek might have had his apprehensions, he might have tried to control himself
for Stiles' sake, but now that Stiles was here, right here, kissing him...
well, there was no more room left in him for restraint. The desire might be new
to him -- or at least the conscious acknowledgement of his desire -- but now
that it was at the forefront of his mind, he didn't even try to deny it.
Denial had gotten him this far, and it had enabled Stiles to take him by
surprise. Derek kind of needed to let go of denial now, because it wasn't going
to be of any further use. He wanted Stiles, and after almost losing him -
- after actually losing him, if only for about five minutes -- he needed to own
up to that.
Something shattered inside of Derek, much like it had that night in the clinic.
But that had been a painful experience; letting go his hard-won, thickly built-
up walls in order to reach out to Stiles and offer him comfort while he became
petrified. This was much the same and Derek felt the wrench, but after the pain
he let himself realize that he could have what he wanted... which was as much a
pleasant emotion as it was a terrifying one.
Stiles had told Derek that he mattered. There had been no lie in his voice, no
shift in his pulse or his scent. He had meant what he had said. This was the
first time Derek had mattered to someone since Laura's murder. Or if not, it
was the first time someone had told him so. It was certainly the first time
Derek had let himself believe it.
Derek didn't understand how he had come to matter to Stiles. He didn't know why
Stiles trusted him. But he knew that Stiles had been speaking the truth, and it
made him feel as much warm and safe as it made him feel afraid and out of
control.
There was fear; this could so easily go wrong. Stiles was letting Derek in,
which meant that Derek could hurt Stiles, he could damage him. And Derek had
told Stiles that he mattered, which gave Stiles a certain amount of power over
him in turn. Derek didn't deal well with those who could affect him in any
way....
And yet, even though Derek didn't think that he trusted Stiles the way Stiles
trusted him, he didn't think that Stiles would do him any harm on purpose. Not
the way that Kate had, or Peter, or Scott....
At least not without good reason, and Derek didn't intend to give him any
reason, good or bad.
"Hey." Stiles dragged his mouth away from Derek's, the lips redder and more
plump than normal, and moist with saliva. His cheeks were pink and he looked
edible, already well on his way to being debauched, but his brow creased in a
concerned frown as his eyes roamed over Derek's face. "Are you okay? Is this
okay, Derek? I can... I can leave if you want...."
He sounded so small and sad and ready to admit defeat that Derek felt guilt
twist in his heart. He wanted Stiles and Stiles wanted him, and if Stiles
really was trusting Derek with his virginity, Derek probably ought to be trying
harder to do this right.
"Don't," he got out, hands tightening where they were unexpectedly resting on
Stiles' hard hips. He wasn't sure how they'd gotten there, but he was glad to
find that he was touching Stiles in returned, even though it had been Stiles
who had been brave enough to touch him first.
Stiles' face shifted into a small but honest smile, his eyes alight, and his
hands curled around Derek's shoulders where he had shifted them when he had
pulled away.
"Is this okay?" he asked, still uncertain. "I wanted... I thought.... But I
might have read things wrong...."
"Take off your shirt," Derek ordered, this time in a completely different tone
than when they had been in Stiles' bedroom the day before. He watched the red
blaze in Stiles' cheeks, hectic patches heating the pale skin, and the scent of
his arousal ratcheted up. They were standing close enough that Derek could feel
Stiles hardening in his jeans, and unlike when he had been becoming petrified,
Derek could appreciate this growing stiffness.
Derek grimaced internally, banishing awful puns from his brain -- it wasn't
funny; Stiles had died -- and focusing instead on the delicious image that
Stiles presented before him, sliding off his plaid and then plucking at the
teeshirt he wore under it.
"You too?" Stiles requested, as though Derek's tank really covered so much.
Derek smirked crookedly and removed the tank as directed, never once breaking
eye contact with Stiles.
Not that Stiles was still looking at Derek's face once he had his shirt off.
His gaze slid down to Derek's chest, eyes heavy-lidded and dark, lips open. It
was flattering, Derek thought. Of course, it wasn't as though Stiles hadn't
seen him without his top on before. But never with so little distance between
them. Never with the intent to relieve Stiles of his virginity....
Stiles still had his teeshirt on, and now that Derek thought about it, he
hadn't ever seen Stiles nearly nude. He'd seen the majority of Stiles' torso a
week ago, when Deaton had been wielding the defibrillator, but Derek preferred
not to think about that right now.
Though it did remind him why it was so important to appreciate what Stiles was
willing to give him right now... because everything that Stiles was could be
torn away at any moment.
That thought was definitely too heavy for Derek to be dwelling on, though, when
Stiles was reaching up with unsteady fingers and lightly tracing the swells of
Derek's pectorals, well above his nipples.
Derek had barely adjusted to the almost ticklish sensation when Stiles whipped
his hand away and swallowed, raising his heated gaze and mumbling, "Sorry."
"Isn't that what we're here for?" Derek asked, quirking one brow.
"Well," Stiles wrung the material of his plaid, which he'd still been clutching
in his free hand, between both of his hands "I just... feel like I should ask
first."
Derek frowned. That wasn't what he'd been expecting, not after Stiles' initial
boldness, and it made him feel awkward and a bit anxious in turn. "Is that what
you want from me?" he wanted to know. "Should I be asking permission?"
Stiles' eyes rounded. "No, actually the opposite of that," he blurted
fervently, face going blotchy red with the heat of his mounting arousal and
possible embarrassment. There was no question that he meant what he said, and
Derek allowed an unabashedly wolfish grin to spread his lips, expose his white
teeth.
"Good," he growled, because that was more like what he'd thought, and now that
he'd decided to let go restraint and anxiety, he was sure of what he wanted and
pretty sure of what Stiles wanted.
Stiles let out a completely undignified squeak when Derek grabbed his teeshirt
and stripped it up over his head and off, then he yelped and flailed as Derek
leaned down to grab him by the knees and lifted, tossing him easily onto his
back on the bed.
"Oh my God!" Stiles choked out, arms and legs all akimbo, bunching and
wrinkling Derek's bedcovers as he wriggled uselessly. "Derek!"
"Problem?" Derek asked, folding his arms and staring down at Stiles. He wasn't
repentant, because he could tell from Stiles' scent that this was exactly what
the boy wanted.
"Well, no." Stiles struggled up onto his elbows, his bare chest heaving. "But a
little warning might be nice."
"It might," Derek agreed amicably, allowing his gaze to slide over Stiles in
his shirtless state. He was toned, which was hardly surprising when he played
lacrosse and fought for his life on a regular basis. He was more than likely
still working through his final growth spurt, but his shoulders were already
startlingly broad and his chest was getting there. He was definitely not a
child.
Derek would be lying to himself if he said he hadn't considered Stiles
sexually. But he'd always put any such thoughts out of his mind before they'd
fully formed. Because... well, sixteen. But if Stiles was old enough to stay
strong and brave while dying in Derek's arms, then he was old enough to demand
this. If Derek was what Stiles wanted, then Derek was just going to have to man
up and admit to his own desires.
"Derek." Stiles was looking up at him, and his expression had gone
unaccountably serious, as though he somehow knew what was passing through
Derek's mind... though he couldn't, right?
"Yeah?" Derek grunted, waiting to see what Stiles said before he decided
whether or not to join him on the mattress.
Stiles licked kiss-bruised lips and it was possible he could have looked more
tempting, Derek thought hungrily, but he would be hard-pressed to say how.
"I keep dreaming... I keep remembering...." Stiles sighed and shook his head.
"I know what it's like to die, okay, and I don't like it. It felt so cold and
distant. I'm glad that you held me, I really am, but I couldn't really feel it.
Could you... get down here and hold me now, so that I can feel how alive I am?"
That was what Derek wanted too, for his own selfish reasons. Besides, that was
too heartbreaking a plea to resist. So Derek hurried to comply, not even
bothering to remove his jeans first.
He joined Stiles on his mattress, as close as they had been when they had been
on Stiles' bed the day before, only this time their chests were bare, and
Stiles was much more confident when he placed his hand over Derek's tattoo and
exerted pressure.
Derek took the hint, bending his head and claiming Stiles' mouth again. This
time he slipped his tongue right between those plump lips that parted so
sweetly when Stiles gasped in surprise, and tasted Stiles' mouth the way he
hadn't had a chance when it had been Stiles kissing him.
Stiles was warm and his muscles were firm but so much softer than they had been
a week ago in Deaton's clinic. Derek allowed himself to appreciate the
distinction, as well as allowing himself to simply appreciate the lithe young
body in his arms.
Maybe this was the reason he'd never allowed himself to deliberately touch
Stiles; because once he began, it was going to prove impossible to stop.
Derek was so used to not being able to have nice things that he wasn't quite
sure how to handle what Stiles was offering. A part of Derek, a big part, was
afraid that merely the act of accepting this and claiming what he wanted would
be enough to have the universe snatching it away from him.
On the other hand. It wasn't as though Stiles was actually a nice thing. He was
a good person, yes, and he'd proven loyal to Derek more than once, but he was
kind of an asshole. Maybe that fact would balance out Derek's natural tendency
toward disaster in his personal life?
It was kind of hard to think with Stiles' tongue twining around his inside the
boy's mouth, the pads of Stiles' fingers dragging over the lines of his tattoo,
Stiles' heart beating hard and fast between them, and small sounds coming from
his throat that were similar to and yet nothing like the noises of pain he'd
been making a week ago.
Exercising courage he hadn't known he possessed, Derek decided to just let
everything go and be in the moment. He had no idea what Stiles wanted, outside
this tangled tryst on his bed right now, but whatever it was, they could deal
with it later.
Later, after they had both gotten off.
Derek was propping most of his weight up on his elbows and knees, trying to be
considerate, but then he remembered that Stiles had said he wanted to feel
this. Stiles was strong, stronger than he looked. Also, he'd reacted pretty
favorably to being manhandled onto the bed.
So, cautiously, Derek allowed his body to settle down on top of Stiles'.
This got him a muffled sound of approval, and a sharp sudden bowing of Stiles'
torso that ground their crotches together, bringing it instantly and undeniably
to Derek's attention that they were both hard. Not that he hadn't known this.
But now he was very aware of that fact.
Stiles was about the same height that Derek was, which put them together, face
to face, chest to chest, belly to belly, and cock to cock. Stiles' legs were
spread to either side of Derek's thighs, but when Derek gave an exploratory
rock of his hips they tightened and Stiles locked his feet together somewhere
behind Derek's knees and he strained into this friction, his fingers scrabbling
desperately at the bunched muscles of Derek's back.
"Oh shit," Stiles breathed, wrenching his mouth away from Derek's and tipping
his head back into the pillows, his chest heaving. It might have been
incidental, the way he'd just bared his throat, but Derek wasn't above taking
advantage.
Stiles let out a cracked sound that wasn't any word Derek knew as he settled
his mouth against the pulse throbbing in that long, pale stretch of neck,
kissing it first, then biting gently before laving it with a broad sweep of his
tongue. He could feel Stiles' nails digging blunt into the skin of his back,
but it didn't bother him. He didn't really dare to give Stiles a hickey where
his father might see, and so he reluctantly left off the beautiful line of
Stiles' throat after giving it a few more lightly sucking kisses.
He wasn't anywhere near done yet, however.
Lifting himself up on his elbows, Derek bent and mouthed at the sharp curve of
Stiles' collarbone, where it pressed stark against the delicate skin. This was
safer, because Stiles could wear a shirt with a higher collar than usual
tomorrow, and so Derek gave in to the overwhelming temptation and bit, hard. He
made sure to keep his teeth human and he made even more sure not to break the
skin, but when he drew away after a very viscerally satisfying moment, he left
behind a perfect imprint of his bite, prominently marking Stiles as his.
Raising his eyes from admiring the red indents that would undoubtedly bruise to
a nice purple within the hour, Derek met Stiles' heated gaze.
"Ow," Stiles said, but he very clearly didn't mean it. Not with the way he was
clinging to Derek's shoulders, arching up against his body, his hips working
away to rub his denim encased hard-on against Derek's, just as tragically
trapped in his jeans. The thick scent of Stiles precome stained the air between
them, a silent testament to how much Stiles had evidently liked that.
"Was that something I should have warned for too?" Derek asked archly, diving
back in and kissing Stiles' mouth crimson and panting before he could answer.
"Damn it," Stiles groaned, once Derek reluctantly released his lips again. He
looked wrecked already and they were both still half-clothed. Derek strongly
suspected that if he hadn't been resting most of his weight on Stiles to
restrain his movement, that he would have already rutted against Derek to the
point of orgasm. He was definitely that eager, and he seemed that close to
popping off and jizzing his pants.
Well, he was sixteen. Derek briefly considered just letting him do it, letting
Stiles frot his way to climax against his lower belly....
But then he'd make a mess in his jeans, and while the thought of Stiles
borrowing his clothes had something in Derek rousing in possessive passion, he
didn't think it would be worth the whining he'd have to put up with in the end.
Since Stiles hadn't said anything about needing a warning, Derek reared back
and knelt between Stiles' legs, moving easily despite the clinging grasp of
both Stiles' arms and legs. Stiles was strong, true, but Derek was stronger.
"Hey!" Stiles protested, already reaching after him, but he shut up real quick
and collapsed back into the mattress with a loud gasp when Derek's hands went
unhesitatingly to the fly of his jeans. "Oh."
His lips curved in a plush circle, red and wet with their mingled saliva, and
it took pretty much all the will power Derek possessed to continue on with his
self-appointed task of freeing Stiles from his jeans rather than pouncing on
him and kissing him breathless all over again.
"I, uh, I approve," Stiles mumbled, obediently raising a leg as Derek dragged
the denim down his lean thigh. He was wearing dark boxers, already liberally
stained at the front, and Derek really wanted to bury his nose in his crotch...
so that was what he did as soon as he tossed the jeans over the edge of the
bed, inhaling deeply. He smelled cotton and laundry detergent, but over it all
and overwhelming was the scent of Stiles' precome, thick and salty and
tempting, making Derek's mouth water.
"Holy shit, no biting there," Stiles squeaked, kind of ruining the moment.
Derek raised his head, sighing. "Really, Stiles?" he asked, rising off the bed
with a little less than his usual grace thanks to the insistent hard-on
pressing at the front of his own jeans.
"Don't go," Stiles blurted, jerking upright and reaching out for Derek with a
frantic panic that startled Derek a little. He did his best to hide this
startlement, though, instead unzipping his fly and shoving his jeans down.
"I'm not going anywhere," he reassured Stiles, brows arching.
Stiles huffed, slumping over and palming at his erection through the thin
material of his boxers. "I wasn't... I was kidding," he offered weakly, and he
wasn't lying, but Derek was more concerned with the way his pulse was
fluttering with clear distress, as though it was painful for him to be
separated from Derek for as long as it took him to undress. "I didn't really
think you'd bite."
"Well, not there," Derek replied, eyeing the pale perfection of Stiles' inner
thighs. Some hickeys, tooth-marks, and maybe some beard burn would compliment
the creamy skin nicely, he thought. Maybe not right now, because they both
wanted to get off, but in the future....
And Stiles was making him think of the future with a frightening amount of
surety, Derek realized.... But there was no way this was going to be a one-time
thing, for either of them. Even though Derek wasn't quite sure where it had
come from, he could be certain of that much.
Stiles was flushed, all the way down his chest, and it should have looked a
little silly but he wore it beautifully. Derek eyed the neat bruises circling
Stiles' clavicle, and he knew that this was only the start. There was so much
more flawless skin for him to mark.
Well, not literally flawless. Derek himself had no scars, having been born a
werewolf, but Stiles had been born human, was still human, and not only did he
run with the wolves, but he had by all accounts been a clumsy child and he was
still prone to falling over for various reasons even now. So, no, his skin was
not technically free of flaws; he had plenty of reminders of past accidents.
Someday Derek thought he might like to mentally catalog all the scars that
Stiles bore on his body. Asking their origin and marking each in his mind with
saliva and fingertips.
But not right now. Right now they somewhere to get, together and quickly.
"Take off your boxers," he instructed, because he wasn't going to remove his
underwear until Stiles took his off, and also because he wanted to get back on
the mattress with Stiles. Getting them both naked before that happened would
make things a lot easier in both the long run and the short run. Tearing
someone's clothes off was possible with claws and supernatural strength, true,
but it wasn't nearly as sexy as it sounded. It tended to result in friction
burns on fragile human flesh, Derek knew. Some things only worked well in
fiction.
Stiles was scarlet by now, but he moved to obey Derek easily enough, hands
already at the waistband of his boxers.
"You too, right?" he asked anxiously, shifting his hips and slowly, agonizingly
slowly tugging the elastic down.
"Of course," Derek replied absently, eyeing the thick line of hair that made
its way down Stiles belly from his navel to....
"Would it be bad manners to tell you to stop staring?"
Stiles sounded nervous, his voice jumping a little, and he'd frozen with his
boxers only halfway down his bony hips. He was still turned on, Derek could
tell at a visual and olfactory level, but less so than he had been a moment
ago.
"No, not really," he said, raising his eyes and looking at Stiles from under
heavy lids. His gaze felt heated and he knew his own cheeks were flushed,
though nowhere near as brightly as Stiles'. "If you want me to stop staring,
I'll stop staring. It should be flattering that I want to stare, though."
Stiles ducked his head, though he maintained eye contact. "It's flattering," he
husked, licking his lips. "And I kind of like it, but...."
"That's fine," Derek gruffed, feeling the need to reassure Stiles. The kid was
confident about a lot of things, but if he'd been telling the truth about being
a virgin -- and Derek saw no reason to doubt his words -- this whole "stripping
to naked in front of someone" was something he didn't have a whole lot of
experience with. Not outside the locker room, where the unwritten rule was
don't look directly at anything below the waist.
Stiles gave him an unexpectedly coy smile and he wriggled his way out of his
boxers, then tossed them over the edge of the bed with a flourish. "Do you like
what you see?" he asked. His face was still burning all the way to the tips of
his ears and he had his knees drawn up to mostly hide his jutting erection, but
he seemed to have regained a majority of his self confidence.
Derek smirked, glad that Stiles was already growing easier with the situation,
within a matter of minutes. Stiles always adapted to things quickly; a trait
that Derek had to admit that he admired, though he would never say so out loud.
"I wouldn't be looking if I didn't like what I saw," he murmured, sliding his
thumbs under the waistband of his boxer-briefs and peeling them down.
Whatever pleased response Stiles might have had to Derek's admittedly somewhat
lackluster compliment was lost when Stiles' eyes widened and his gaze fixed on
Derek's hard cock.
"Whoa." Stiles' mouth was curved in that red circle again, and Derek gave
passing thought to sliding the head of his cock right in there, smooth as silk
and hot as the blood pumping through Stiles' heart. Maybe later. Maybe later he
would have Stiles begging for it.
Derek had no idea what sort of desires Stiles had, what sort of fantasies he
indulged in, but he was willing to learn and to enact as many with them as
Stiles wanted. And now that they were here, Derek was discovering that he had a
few of his own that he would like to give a try.
"Down," he commanded, one hand pressing at Stiles' shoulder, one knee on the
mattress, and then as Stiles settled back into the rumpled covers as directed,
Derek crawled over him once again.
"You know, it's kind of sexy when you order me around," Stiles said, opening
his thighs again and spreading his hands over Derek's chest, fingers brushing
over his nipples as he took his place there, "But don't always expect me to
roll over for you."
Derek quirked a brow and grinned wickedly. "But there's so many benefits to
rolling over for me," he rumbled, lowering himself onto Stiles and grinding
their hard cocks together. Stiles was well endowed and while Derek took a
certain juvenile satisfaction in knowing he was bigger, he was also impressed.
It felt good, the thick shaft of Stiles' cock sliding alongside his own between
the pressure of their bellies, the rounded tip of Stiles' cock bumping at the
base of his cock head.
"Ooh, you bastard," Stiles moaned, wrapping his arms around Derek and clinging.
His hips jolted and Derek could feel a blurt of heated wetness breaking between
them, staining the skin of their stomachs.
He chuckled unrepentantly, pressing the side of his face to the side of Stiles'
face, breathing into the sworls of his ear, then lapping at the lobe before
drawing it into his mouth.
Stiles whined, squirming restlessly beneath Derek, arms tight around his
shoulders, fingers digging into the nape of Derek's neck.
Derek allowed this, even though it was showing Stiles an awful lot of trust.
Stiles probably didn't realize that, though, so it was all right.
It struck Derek unexpectedly that he might actually trust Stiles, to a certain
extent, but he wasn't going to focus on that right now. He couldn't, when he
had Stiles under him, their bodies pressed together, Stiles' hard-on punching
up alongside his between them as he rocked against Derek with steadily growing
intent.
He wanted to touch Stiles all over, Derek thought hazily as he licked and
sucked lightly at Stiles' neck again, tasting the salt of perspiration and
desire on his skin, listening to Stiles' panting in his ear, but he didn't
think that was going to happen right now. His hands were settled over Stiles'
shoulders, holding him still as he set to his own rocking rhythm. He set a more
deliberate pace, and he had more traction with his knees buried in the
mattress.
Stiles let out a whining sound, arms locking more frantically around Derek's
shoulders, fingers scrabbling for a hold. He wasn't scratching, which Derek was
grateful for, but he seemed to need something to cling to.
"Derek," he whined, but when nothing more came out of his mouth other than some
hard breaths, Derek shifted to kiss his mouth again, and then again, light and
wet, rubbing their lips together, keeping it gentle to avoid clashing their
teeth. The heat of passion was one thing, but Derek didn't get off on pain and
he didn't think Stiles did either.
What was going on in the humid lack of space between their lower bellies was
pretty much the complete opposite of pain, and Derek was growing short of
breath himself, his motions becoming quicker and more choppy as the pleasure
increased, flooding his system, overwhelming higher brain functions.
Was he going to rut against Stiles until they both came? Evidently so. And he
couldn't bring himself to care, not when it felt this good, when Stiles sounded
and smelled so delicious. Their precome was mingled, smeared all over both
their stomachs, and Derek swore he could feel the prickly catch of Stiles'
glory trail as he rubbed his hard cock shamelessly into Stiles' lower abdomen.
Stiles' legs were locked around him again, even more tightly than before, and
he was twisting as much as he could manage beneath Derek's overwhelming weight,
low whines and small moans escaping his wet mouth along with his ragged gasps
for air.
Derek wanted to ask if Stiles felt alive now, but that would have required
forming words and he was a little beyond that right now. He was pretty sure he
knew the answer to that anyway. He could feel Stiles everywhere, over every
inch of his skin, even in places they were not touching, and the mingled scent
of their sex swept over his senses in a heady rush.
Considering that it was Stiles who was the sixteen year old virgin, Derek was
more than a little surprised when he was the one who came first. It was a
little like being smacked in the back of the head by a baseball bat, only it
was pure pleasure that broke through him and flooded his system, rather than
pain. He hunched, breath escaping him in a throttled grunt, and his cock jumped
as he spent himself on Stiles' stomach, shooting off all over Stiles' own
twitching cock in thick spurts.
"Oh my God," Stiles gasped, somehow managing to form an actual sentence, though
he spoke it all as one word, and then he was shivering and shaking in the
circle of Derek's possessive embrace as his own climax took him, his entire
lower torso rocking hard enough to shift Derek, his cock spitting blood-hot and
wet jizz all over both of them, mixing with Derek's own in the most amazing
scent Derek had ever smelled in his life.
Feeling as though all his bones were heated liquid now, Derek allowed himself
to slump over Stiles, burying his face in the curve of his neck. Their bodies
were pressed together, his tingling cock still caught in the slick-wet heat
between their bellies, and Derek lazily licked at the sweat coating the skin in
front of his mouth. He knew he was heavy, all compact muscle and plenty of it,
but Stiles was no delicate flower; he could handle it, if only for as long as
it took Derek to get his breathing under control.
Derek wallowed in the afterglow for a few glorious minutes, eventually lifting
his head enough to kiss Stiles on the mouth. Stiles sleepily kissed back, lips
soft and pliable, his own breathing slowing to a normal rate, and then he
pushed at Derek's shoulder.
"Off," he mumbled into Derek's chin, and Derek reluctantly complied, sliding to
the side but keeping Stiles close. He made a long arm and retrieved Stiles'
discarded shirt, using it to wipe off some of the jizz covering both of them, a
smug smirk hovering at the edges of his lips. He would lend Stiles one of his
own shirts once it was time to get dressed. Unlike the jeans, that was
something that was completely reasonable, and it was going to be one hundred
percent sexy.
"Gross," Stiles sighed happily, either not noticing or not caring that his
shirt was now filthy. He ran a hand over his belly, then Derek's, fingers
sliding through the lingering traces of their semen, then he raised his hand
and the top of Derek's head nearly blew off as he lapped delicately at the thin
sheen on his fingertips.
"Definitely gross," Stiles declared, but he was grinning wickedly at Derek as
he said it, laying there on Derek's sheets, his face pink, his mouth red, his
eyes hot and sated, covered in Derek's saliva and semen, a mark of ownership
rising on his collarbone, his hair dark with sweat, and he made no protest when
Derek wrapped him up in his arms, pulling him achingly close and claiming his
mouth, kissing away the flavor of them both from those plush lips.
"So, that was kind of unexpected," Stiles said softly, once they'd gotten their
fill of kissing and were laying there with Stiles tucked up against Derek's
side, his head pillowed on Derek's shoulder. They should probably go and bathe
or something, but Derek liked the way they smelled, the way they felt together
right now. He was in no hurry, and if Stiles kept aimlessly trailing his
fingertips over his chest the way he was doing, Derek was going to be ready for
round two of dealing with what might remain of Stiles' virginity before too
much time had passed.
"Was it?" he asked, because at this point he wasn't really sure any longer.
Stiles had invited, Derek had acted....
Well, in all honesty it had been Stiles who had acted upon his own invitation.
But Derek hadn't at any point resisted, and once he'd realized that they both
wanted this he'd been proactive about making sure they both got it. They'd
gotten where they were, laying here covered in sweat and jizz, together.
"Mm, maybe," Stiles hummed, turning his head and pressing a heavy kiss to
Derek's pectoral. It sent a shiver through him, affecting him more than he
would have expected. Mostly on a physical level, but it made his heart ache as
well, and not in a bad way. "Maybe not."
They rested in silence for a few moments, Derek breathing in the smell of them
both, feeling his cock throbbing warm and sated, spent but still plump with
pleasure, his arms holding Stiles close, Stiles' breath hot and moist on his
shoulder. Derek felt contented. He knew it wouldn't last. He knew it couldn't
last. But that didn't mean he wasn't allowed to enjoy it right now.
"It was kind of unexpected," Stiles yawned, evidently coming to a decision.
"Yeah," Derek agreed, shifting his hand to scratch at Stiles' scalp through his
hair. They really ought to go and bathe, but right now moving was about the
furthest thing from his mind.
"I didn't.... I didn't even think you liked me," Stiles said, shifting in
Derek's arms, but closer, not further away. "I kind of thought you hated me.
But then that night...."
"You're not allowed to die," Derek ground out, his embrace tightening. "Never
again, Stiles. Once was more than-- more than enough."
He wanted to say "More than I could take," but that would be revealing too
much, rendering himself too vulnerable. Though if there was anyone he could
show his underbelly to, it just might be Stiles. Maybe. Someday.
"Dude, not planning on it," Stiles huffed, sounding annoyed and amused all at
once. He wasn't taking his own death lightly, Derek instinctively understood,
but neither of them wanted to dwell on it any further right now.
"Don't call me dude," Derek instructed, and smiled a little when Stiles laughed
breathlessly.
He reluctantly loosened his grip when Stiles squirmed against him, but all
Stiles did was shove him onto his back and then scramble over top of him,
straddling his waist, his limp cock heating the skin right above Derek's navel,
his hands spread over Derek's chest again, his face pink as he stared down at
Derek with intent focus.
"Can we do that again?" Stiles asked, wriggling a little, then blushing as this
move ground his bare ass into Derek's belly. "I don't want to leave until I can
be sure I'm not a virgin anymore."
Derek grinning up at him, hands sliding easily over the bony protrusions of
Stiles' hips, fingertips caressing the upper swells of his buttocks. He could
have pointed out that by most definitions of virginity, getting off together
had taken care of that. But there were other, more particular definitions of
virginity and the loss thereof, so if Stiles wanted to take a stab at some of
those....
Well, who was Derek to try to dissuade him?
There was one thing he wanted to find out before they got back to it, though.
Derek probably could have left it alone, and normally he would have. But it was
nagging at him, and he didn't think he would get a better time to ask, than
when Stiles was squirming naked on top of his stomach.
"Stiles, why was it my number you called?" he asked, caressing Stiles' hips and
ass, palming his thighs, but always maintaining eye contact. "And don't give me
any more bullshit about it being an accident. You didn't know I was in the wood
but you called me anyway."
Stiles' face twisted into an expression that Derek couldn't read. Not that this
was anything unusual; he often had trouble figuring Stiles out.
"I called you because I knew you'd come for me," Stiles said, staring at Derek
intently. "I wasn't bullshitting when I said that I trusted you."
"Huh." Derek stared back, mulling that over. It wasn't really surprising, and
yet it was. It was a little scary hearing Stiles say it, knowing just how much
he trusted Derek.
"It's no big deal," Stiles said, shrugging, and he almost sounded like he meant
it. He sounded like he wanted to mean it, but Derek knew better, and so he only
hesitated for a moment before he told Stiles;
"If our situations had been reversed, it would have been you that I called."
"Really?" Stiles brows rose, arching over his eyes in wings of startlement.
Derek considered what he had just said. "Well, probably." He considered it some
more. "Maybe."
Instead of getting offended, Stiles laughed and dropped down so that he was
sprawled over top of Derek, wriggling until he could kiss him.
"If you'd been turning to stone you'd have been even harder to lift than you
are now, so if something like that happens to you, feel free to call someone
else to do the heavy lifting," he murmured into Derek's chin, his teeth sharp,
nipping carefully through the stubble, sending a flash of arousal through Derek
that he had no intention of denying. "Someone who's got werewolf strength.
But... I wouldn't complain if I was at the top of your speed dial list."
He sounded amused and confident, yes, but Derek thought he detected a trace of
doubt and insecurity underneath the lightness of his tone. So it didn't really
cost him much to tell Stiles the truth.
"You're already at the top of my contacts."
"Really?" Stiles reared up far enough that he could meet Derek's eyes, his own
round and almost frightened. Derek understood, though. They were treading on
new ground here, and neither of them really knew what they were doing.
"I know you'll probably pick up," he informed Stiles. "Scott's more likely to
listen to you than me. And your father is the Sheriff, even though we both want
to keep him out of the supernatural side of things."
Stiles nodded faintly, his gaze distant. "Makes sense." He smiled and ducked
his head slightly. "Th-thanks... I guess."
"Am I at the top of your contact list?" Derek felt compelled to ask, allowing
his hands to slid down, digging his fingers into the taut swells of Stiles'
ass. It felt amazing under his palms and he almost lost track entirely of what
they were saying.
"Lucky for me," Stiles said, with a huff of breath that broke over Derek's
throat as he lowered his head and licked carefully at his Adam's apple.
"Otherwise I'd be--"
"Don't say it," Derek growled, flipping them both so that he had Stiles
underneath him all over again. Even though they both knew it was true, he hated
the thought of Stiles being dead and staying dead.
"Derek!" Stiles squalled, hands grasping at Derek's shoulders and legs kicking
out ineffectually. "Damn it!"
"You know you like it," Derek told him wickedly, feeling powerfully that the
time for serious conversation was over. Even though he'd been the one to bring
it up.... But he'd found out what he wanted to know, and he'd virtually
confessed to Stiles that he actually trusted him. He hadn't said it in so many
words, no, but Stiles was bright and he'd probably already figured it out. It
had certainly taken Derek long enough to figure it out. Or at least to be
willing to admit to it.
"It's not...." Stiles let out a little huff. "I can't just let you get away
with it," he grumbled, punching Derek's shoulder in a blow that wouldn't have
hurt even if he'd been human.
"That doesn't mean you want me to stop," Derek pointed out, nosing at the mark
he'd left on Stiles' collarbone. He understood, without Stiles having to
articulate it. From his scent and his body language, Stiles very much enjoyed
being manhandled by Derek. And yet he couldn't let go his autonomy and just
limply take it. His pride wouldn't allow that, and if Derek was honest, it
wouldn't be any fun for him either.
Stiles might not be prey, exactly, but he was fun to hunt and pounce and play
with. Derek was pretty sure they were both going to enjoy the chase. Nothing
was ever easy with the two of them, so why should sex be different? Derek liked
that Stiles put up a protest. And if he ever actually meant it, then Derek
would back off in a heartbeat. But so far, though Stiles had squeaked and
writhed against him, he'd done nothing to indicate that was doing anything
other than turning him on. A lot.
"So, did you want to find out what I can do if you roll over for me?" Derek
wondered, licking at the purpling bruises he'd marked in Stiles' pale skin. He
could feel the blood hot beneath the surface, and he could smell Stiles'
renewed arousal... as well as his own.
"I, um, I might be willing to admit to a small amount of curiosity," Stiles
coughed out, and even without looking Derek knew that he was blushing again.
This despite the fact that they'd been rubbing their cocks all over each other
just now, had come all over each other, and were on the verge of doing more,
much more.
But then, maybe it was because they were about to do more, go further. Derek
didn't get off on the whole "blushing virgin" thing -- which was good, because
once he was done with Stiles he wouldn't be a virgin anymore -- but he was
definitely very happy to know that no one else had ever touched Stiles the way
he had, the way he was going to do. It made something deep inside him rumble in
pride and contentment.
"So, roll over," he instructed, lifting himself off of Stiles a little and
giving him a commanding look.
Stiles stared back for several heartbeats, then a wide smile curved his lips.
"Why don't you make me," he challenged.
Since he had no reason not to, Derek did.
And true to his unspoken promise, they both enjoyed it very much.
Derek still hoped he'd never have to hold Stiles while he died, ever again, and
he had no intention of losing him now that he had him, but at least now Stiles
couldn't complain about dying a virgin.
Derek was going to take care of Stiles from here on out. And maybe, just maybe,
he'd allow Stiles to take care of him in turn.
Chapter End Notes
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