Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/126823.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Gundam_Wing
  Relationship:
      Quatre_Raberba_Winner/Heero_Yuy
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe, School, Sexual_Content, Romance
  Stats:
      Published: 2004-11-15 Words: 3174
****** Spiral ******
by Misanagi
Summary
     On his tenth year high school reunion, Heero Yuy gets the chance to
     relive the past. Heero's POV
Notes
     This fic is my entry to the Back-to-School Smutathon challenge
     organized by Ponderosa and windsor blue, filling Briony's request.
     Thanks to Anne for the beta.
      
     //Flashbacks//
"Heero Yuy"
When I decided to attend my tenth year high school reunion I had hoped I would
meet him. I had known that he would be here but that doesn't stop me from
tensing when I hear his voice. I stare at my glass of white wine, looking at
the liquid as if it's the most interesting thing in the world. His name escapes
my lips but I don't turn around.
He stands beside me and all I can see is his right hand. His shirt is white and
a simple gold cufflink adorns it. The hands are as pale as I remember and the
long manicured fingers seem to belong with the calluses he has from playing the
violin. A glass of red wine is in his hand; he lifts it slowly and brings it to
his lips. I can't help but follow the motion. His lower lip is slightly thicker
than the upper one; he used to like it when I bit it.
"It's been a long time."
Too long. About eight years since the last time I had heard his voice, and even
more since I saw him. I raise my eyes and, for a moment, I see his seventeen-
year-old self with his dark blue blazer, loosening his tie. I blink. He is now
wearing a dark stripped gray suit and a deep blue tie; and I don't know which
vision is more mesmerizing.
He smiles at me. "It's good to see you."
I nod slightly and the corners of my mouth twitch. "You too." I look him over
from head to toe. "You seem to be doing fine. Are you managing your father's
company?"
He smirks and his eyes shine in the same way they did the time we paid a
stripper to give the headmaster a lap dance at the school assembly. "I went
into business for myself."
I raise an eyebrow. So he got his wish. He is now independent and apparently
very successful at it. I feel something click: I still know him. The awkward
meeting is over and I'm staring at my best friend and my first lover again. The
illusion of age and the lost years are gone, and he is just Quatre.
* * *
"I saw you a year ago," he confesses while he lights up a cigarette. "You were
with a blonde girl." He puts the lighter in his pocket and turns his eyes to
the stars. "You seemed close."
"Relena," I say. "It didn't work but we are still friends." I know that my
voice is neutral but I also know that Quatre can read me better than anyone.
"I'm sorry."
I'm not looking at him; I'm watching the ashes fall to the ground before flying
on the soft wind. "Don't be. It takes two people to drift apart."
We stay silent for a while. He finishes his smoke, drops the butt on the grass
and steps on it. I'm startled when he grabs my hand, holding it closely between
his cold ones, and looks at me. "I should have tried more."
Rationally, I know he is wrong. He's always been one to take responsibility for
everything. Blaming himself is Quatre's natural reaction, and this time, I feel
tempted to let him. Illogical as it might be, there's a part of me that wants
to ask him why he stayed away. It was his job to prevent time and distance from
cutting our ties. He failed.
I hear him sigh and I notice that he's staring at the stars again. He is
avoiding my eyes, and that isn't something Quatre does. "I met someone in
college. He always says that time isn't really a straight line, but a spiral;
we are just too insignificant to notice. Time can separate, but at the end it
will always bring back together those who were never meant to drift apart."
There is something in his voice; something that lets me know that I'm not the
only one who has spent life asking 'what if?'
"You sound close."
He looks confused for a moment but he soon understands me. "Trowa," he says.
"It didn't work, but we are still friends."
* * *
"I think I had one too many glasses of wine." He is leaning on the corridor
wall, his tie hanging loosely around his neck. He opens the top button of his
shirt.
"You could never hold your liquor."
He glares at me. The same glare he used when I teased him and he couldn't say
anything back. He glances at the door of the auditorium where we can still hear
the jovial music, signaling that the party is still going on. "I can't go back
in there." He grimaces. "My ears are already pounding."
I put my hand on the wall behind him, leaning until our noses are only inches
apart. He looks at me with steady eyes and I know that he is trying to read me,
like I'm trying to read him.
"Maybe you need to go someplace quiet." I smirk when his pupils wide slightly.
He understands the implications of my words, and it takes him less than a
second to nod.
I smile.
* * *
"It hasn't changed at all." He walks directly to the history section, hiding
behind the tall bookshelves. "This is the place where we made love for the
first time."
I remember that night well enough, and he knows I do; he is just stating it to
make it real, to build a bridge in time. I decide to play along. "You were
drunk then too."
He emerges from behind a shelf. Somehow he seems taller; every muscle of his
body is tense. His eyes are hard, but not cold. "I'm not drunk, and I wasn't
then either."
Always doubt a person who affirms he is sober. However, there is something
about the way he is acting that doesn't let me do more than believe him.
"I would have never slept with you if I wasn't sober enough to comprehend my
actions." His eyes soften. "You deserve better."
Leaving me alone with my thoughts, he disappears behind the books again. We
were seventeen then. I had thought that he had acted like the hormonal teenager
he was, at least that first time. Now, ten years later, I'm standing in the
same place, and it's as if I'm seeing what happened for the first time.
 
// "I want you"
"You drank too much today; tell me again in the morning."
He grabbed my hand and made me look at him. A soft kiss, a sincere look. "I
want you."
I kissed him back. //
 
I walk through the library, following his scent, but yet knowing exactly where
he went. I find him leaning against the wall. He is skimming a book; not
reading, just using the words as a place to run to where he can wander
endlessly, finding his way.
"I'm sorry." I'm not like him; I don't apologize often, but I can admit when
I'm wrong.
His eyes leave the yellowish pages of the book and focus on me. "It's in the
past." He closes the book with one hand, and puts it back in its place.
 
// "We need to go, Quatre. They're going to catch us."
His head was resting on top of my chest. He was exhaling through his mouth; the
warm breath tickled my skin.
"I know," he said, but didn't move. "It's just... if we go, if we put on our
clothes and leave, then it will all be in the past." His head shifted a little
and he looked at me. "I don't want that."
I ran my hands slowly through his hair. ""There'll be other times." //
 
"You can never go back," I say, taking off my suit jacket, "but you can always
remember."
Those sincere eyes are on me again. "I never forgot you, Heero. You should know
that."
I close the gap between us, kissing him softly on the lips. The first is always
remembered, but no matter what, I could have never forgotten Quatre.
He grabs my lower lip between his teeth and takes it to his mouth. His tongue
dances over it, tasting it, claiming it. I moan. No one kisses like him.
 
//My back was pressed against the wall and he was leaning towards me, coming
closer and closer. I knew he was going to kiss me. It wasn't my first kiss but
it was my first with him. I stayed still, awkward for a moment, not knowing
what to do. As soon as his lips were on mine I felt the need to take him, to
make him mine. My teeth grasped his lip and I had to resist the urge to bite
hard. I tasted him slowly, memorizing every feeling, every twitch. I let go and
gasped.
Opening my eyes I saw him. His eyes still tightly shut and his mouth slightly
open.//
 
The wall is the only thing keeping him upright. It was only a kiss but, after
so long, it has become a statement that shouts that we still fit together. As I
look at him I realize how much I've missed that expression; that look of pure
relaxation I used to see so often in his face.
"You kissed me that first time," I say to him. "You took the first step." He
blinks and I put my hand behind his neck. "It's my turn to reverse things."
He gives me the slightest nod before I pull him towards me and we share another
kiss.
This time it's not tentative, but powerful. I lean into him, he leans against
the wall, and our bodies press together. His hands are swift and soon my shirt
hangs open. I feel the silk of his shirt against my skin.
 
// His shirt lay forgotten on the floor. The striped blue tie hung loosely
around his neck, slightly covered by a few drops of sweat. He always hated
ties; ever since the first time his father forced him to wear one at the age of
four.
He moved his hands to his neck but I stopped him. "The tie stays."//
 
Putting a hand above mine he simply says "No". I leave the tie alone and help
him get rid of his. It's not the dark blue uniform one, but we are playing,
mixing the past with the present, and some elements need to be different but
yet the same.
"I've dreamt of this," he confesses, his fingers moving to my belt. "I always
woke up to an empty bed."
"What about Trowa?" I try hard to keep the jealousy out of my voice.
He takes off my belt slowly but his eyes are fixed on mine. "I love him, but he
isn't you."
He doesn't need to ask about Relena. I give him a simple understanding smile,
and he knows.
 
// I was bare before him. The space between us was nearly inexistent and the
wall behind me prevented me from moving.
He still had his pants; the pants and the tie. "Have you ever…" he looked as
nervous as I felt.
"No," I answered. "Have you?"
He shook his head and lowered his eyes, staring at his fidgeting fingers. "I'm
not sure what to do."
I was no expert but I had been curious enough to find out as much as I could.
"Let's go slow," I said, my hands moving to his trousers. "Trust me."//
 
I gasp and throw my head back. The mixture of sensations is too much to take. I
whisper his name, trying to control my breathing, my pulse, my hands, myself.
Blinking, I notice that a couple of tears managed to escape my eyes, moistening
my eyelashes and making my vision even more blurry than it already is.
My head drops forward, my chin resting on my sweaty chest; my hands are still
buried on his hair. He has already released me from his mouth and now he is
leaning on the wall; my pants lay crumbled below him. "You are as amazing as
always," he says, looking up at me. His voice is very soft, as if he fears that
any loud sound is going to break the moment.
"Quatre, you are the amazing one."
 
//"I don't want to hurt you." He was standing farther away from me that he had
all night. His arms were hugging his chest and his head was a little bit
lowered. I could read the reluctance in his body. "After that, after what you
just did for me… I can't. I can't hurt you."
I could still feel his taste on my lips, but most of all, I could still hear
the sound of his voice as he cried my name and the incoherent mumbles of his
afterglow. "Trust me," I repeated and reached for my backpack, where a small
tube that I'd been carrying for more than a week was ready to be used. //
 
"Did you remember to bring lube?" he asks, pulling me down so I'm kneeling in
front of him.
I smirk. "I guess I didn't get the memo."
His eyes shine with malice. He puts his hands behind his head and leans on the
wall. "Well, then Mr. Yuy," he says in a lazy tone, "you won't be getting any
of this."
I look down at him and close the gap between us until my lips are almost
touching his. "Excuse me, Mr. Winner, but I brought the lube that time, and
since we are exchanging places, I believe it's only fair that you handle that
little detail this time." I can't resist. I bite his lower lip, taking it into
my mouth and sucking before releasing it.
"I wasn't aware that we were going to be desecrating the library again." I hold
his stare and he gives up. He reaches for his jacket and hands me a tube. "But
I had hoped we would."
 
// I closed my eyes and clenched my teeth. He was moving slowly and the tips of
his fingers were caressing my check. I forced myself to concentrate on that
touch, and the pain soon faded to discomfort.
He stopped moving and waited patiently for me to tell him that it was okay,
that he could go on. "I'm fine. You can move."
I felt a small kiss on my forehead and opened my eyes. He was smiling down at
me, his eyes were shining. He moved, and after a few moments the discomfort was
forgotten, and there was only pleasure." //
 
His hands always used to be cold, but now they are warm. He is spreading the
lube on me, awakening my erection. We are both kneeling, facing each other. I
manage to move my right hand and get a hold of the tube. Awkwardly, I put some
on my fingers and start teasing his entrance.
He groans; a small sound of frustration that only helps my arousal. I keep
teasing.
"Heero!" The way he says my name is a demand as well as a plea.
"Yes, Quatre?"
He groans again. He knows I like to hear him talk. No matter how far gone we
are, I like listening to the sound of his voice. And he talks; he always talked
because he knew I liked it.
"Come on!" His hands suddenly stop moving but I can still feel them on me.
"I'll talk, Heero, just talk back to me."
I let my middle finger penetrate him slowly. He holds his breath and I stay
very still until he exhales.
"The first time we did this I was sure we were going to stay together forever."
His words are only a whisper. I move my finger and he blinks repeatedly. "We
were so young."
My left hand holds the back of his neck. He gasps; it's one of his sensitive
spots. "I thought that too," I whisper back, slipping another finger inside
him. "Back then, there was no one else."
A wave of pleasure runs through me as his hold on my erection gets firmer. "And
now?" he asks.
"Nothing has changed."
 
// "I..." he diverted his eyes, he was nervous. "I've been thinking about this
for a long time."
I kissed him deeply, tasting every inch of his mouth until we both needed some
air. "Me too," I admitted.
"Maybe we can do this again sometime?"
"Yes, again." //
 
He is panting, lying below me. His body is covered in sweat and his erection is
pressing against my stomach. His eyes are open. While he closes them when he
kisses, he doesn't believe in missing anything other than that. He won't allow
himself to shut off any of his senses. I like closing my eyes, but there is no
way I will choose darkness over the picture of ecstasy that is presented to me.
He is looking at me the way I imagine myself looking at him. I wonder what he
sees.
I'm panting too. My senses feel like they are going to overload as I go deeper
and deeper inside him. He is mumbling something but I don't understand; I can't
understand anything right now. I'm moving, fast, faster, and his mumbles, loud,
louder.
A drop of my sweat falls on his forehead. He doesn't notice. He is too busy
just looking at me, feeling me.
I can't hear but I know the sound is all around me. I want to arch my head back
and scream but I don't want to lose sight of him. I'm making sounds but I can't
hear them. His eyes loose focus, his mouth opens and he gasps my name. I
exhale, we both explode.
"Q- Quatre." And I collapse on top of him.
* * *
The place is empty. We make our way in the darkness, out of the building. It's
chilly and we instinctively walk closer together.
"My car is that way." He points in the opposite direction to where I'd parked
my bike.
"I'm the other way."
He nods and gives me a polite smile, but his eyes look sad. "I guess this is
goodbye." He swallows. "It was good seeing you."
I hug him close enough to feel the erratic beating of his heart. I count thirty
beats before I pull away slowly and kiss him. He bites my lower lip.
We turn around and walk. I stop after a few steps and notice him entering a
silver car. He turns on the lights but the engine is still off. It's only when
I reach my bike that I realize he's waiting.
A spiral. Whatever drifted us apart has the power to bring us back together. I
was meant to find someone at this reunion... or maybe he was meant to find me.
I speed off until I find the silver car. I stop in front of it and see his
face, and the genuine smile that graces it. He turns the engine on and slowly
drives out of the parking lot.
I follow.
This time we'll make our way down the spiral together.
Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed
their work!

       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
Stiles screamed.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
The chains they had on Derek had links as thick around as his fingers. There
was nothing to describe the sound they made when they popped, one by one.
His head swam.
There was an exchange of gunfire.
Screaming, but most of it wasn’t his own.
And a raw, overpowering roar that made Stiles feel like his chest was going to
vibrate apart from the reverberations it caused through his personal rusty
barrel.
Had he passed out again?
Wet noises.
Crunching, and a few keening whimpers.
Stiles’ eyes met Derek’s red glare, and the werewolf’s muzzle was smeared with
crimson. Beneath him, one of the hunters was still moving as Derek leaned down
and burrowed his muzzle up through the man’s torn chest wall.
Bubbles of blood formed at the corners of the hunter’s mouth.
When Derek surfaced, he had the man’s trachea between his teeth, and Stiles was
pretty sure that was a tongue on the end of it, somehow.
He vomited nothing but bile and semen, and most of it all over himself, because
he was awesome like that.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
Cold air.
Everything hurt, and there were teeth in his skin and fur somewhere. Maybe
everywhere.
His heels were dragging on the ground, and his cell phone was vibrating in his
pocket. When Stiles lifted his broken hands to try ineffectually clutching into
the slickblack fur of Derek’s ruff, he came away with still-warm blood and part
of an ear.
So there was that.
And the world went back.
        [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiral.gif]
***** derek *****
Chapter Summary
     But Stiles was his.
Chapter Notes
     Derek's POV.
     Same warnings apply, with a dash of possessiveness thrown in, to
     boot.
     I would say it's not as graphic, but I don't like to lie.
     I'm so sorry.
     (As always, thank you for everyone who has taken the time to leave
     kudos/comments/sent me asks on Tumblr. It means the world to me, it
     truly does.)
        [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiral.gif]
Derek liked October, insomuch as he let himself like any month.
All of the obnoxious back-to-school ads were gone, squealing children at bus
stops had transitioned from bubbling, painfully-loud excitement to resignation,
and the wet, raw smell of fallen leaves stirred things in a part of his psyche
that was purely instinctual. Autumn was a time of warm sweaters, hearty food,
and nesting.
It was also the start of two seasons in which you were meant to cleave close to
your family: Hallowe’en, when you helped your little cousins with their
superhero costumes; Thanksgiving, where the clan was torn between arguing about
who had the best turkey recipe and questioning the validity of a holiday whose
basis was genocide; Winter Solstice, when the werewolves ran wild through the
icy woods, baying at the frozen sky; and what Laura had called ChristmaHannuka,
filled with lights, presents, food, and evergreen boughs but startlingly few
religious overtones beyond the fact that some of them were Christian and some
of them were Jewish, because it was all just an excuse to gather together.
Except all that was in the past, and instead of coming home to a house heated
to nearly tropical levels and filled with whatever spiced goodies dad was
conjuring up in the kitchen, Derek only had the barren, drafty shell of his
memories left.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
Derek was in the annual process of creating excuses not to spend time at the
Hale house. Some of them were even more-or-less valid. With his pack of minors
tucked safely back in school during the day, then wrapped up in sports and
studying afterwards, the territory patrols they’d been doing over the summer
months all fell back on their Alpha. Peter, for his part, was mostly staying
out of the way, and Derek didn’t actually trust him enough to bring him along.
Being out in the woods on foot, or coasting around on back roads in his
sister’s Camaro, Derek managed to stay away from introspection. There was
always a scent or sound to follow, a subtle warning to post up that only
another werewolf would understand, a stranger passing through town to keep an
eye on. Beacon Hills wasn’t precisely a hotbed of traffic, transience, or
mysterious occurrences (despite what recent events might lead one to believe),
but Derek preferred to be safe than sorry.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
It was only once he ran out of things to do that Derek would drag himself home,
exhausted and hoping to be able to find solace in sleep. But the stress of
being Alpha weight heavily on him, and Derek rarely felt rested. The smell of
charred wood consumed his senses and, not infrequently, he’d wake before dawn
with the absolute certainty that he’d caught the faint whiff of someone whose
ashes still clung to the remaining walls.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
It was like any other Wednesday, a week before the Hunter’s Moon. Half-way
between the new moon and the full was a pretty good time for werewolves. Energy
was up, but not irritatingly so, and there was a particular clarity of focus, a
positive take on things that made even the shitty, daily grind seem a little
bit better.
Derek was finishing his rounds when he saw a dirty white van roll down a
rarely-used side street. Nothing stood out about it except for how little stood
out about it: it was almost too nondescript, a carefully-constructed nonentity
for one’s eyes to simply skip over. With nothing better to do, Derek opted to
investigate, following the van with less stealth than he normally opted for. He
suspected that the van contained nothing more nefarious than some tweakers
looking for a bit of privacy, but instead of taking the turn-off for the game
preserve, the van trundled on towards one of the abandoned steel foundries that
had long since been decommissioned. A forlorn “For Sale” sign, weathered nearly
to the point of illegibility, clacked against the rusted posts where a gate
used to be, and newer “No Trespassing” signs littered the dark buildings.
The van turned a corner, Derek still in slow-speed pursuit, windows open to
allow all his senses to pay attention.
He never saw the man perched on top of the small security outpost, and before
he heard the blow-dart whizzing in his direction it was already embedded in his
neck.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
The tranquilizer should have kept him under at least another half hour or so,
but the sheer wrongness of the environment started to rouse Derek. The wet,
metallic, rusty smell of the industrial site flooded his consciousness. As he
lifted his head, more of the nuances started to sink in: various trace
chemicals, the creak of old exhaust fan blades turning in a slow breeze, the
smell and sound of people.
It was only when he tried to get up that Derek managed to get his eyes open, a
startled growl building in his belly. Someone had shoved a dirty rag in his
mouth, strapping it tight with electrical tape. He was kneeling, folded over
his thighs by heavy, rusted chains, wrists bound tight at the small of his
back. Someone had known what they were doing: without any wiggle room, there
was no room to work up the force to snap the chains.
The cage they had shoved him in was only held shut by a crow bar through the
loops where a padlock should have been, but he would still have to get at it
before he could do any damage.
Before he could get a better look around, one of the men approached him and
touched the end of a live wire to the bars of his cage. Before he passed out,
Derek thought it was highly amateur of them not to have gone with wolfsbane
instead.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
Derek smelled Stiles long before he could see him. A werewolf’s nose was one of
its most sensitive organs, and it could pick out a member of its pack even at a
great distance or through seemingly unlikely barriers. Stiles wasn’t pack, not
really, but he had that feeling of pack-family-ally that humans who hung around
werewolves always seemed to emit. Derek’s nose picked him out easily, a
combination of teenage boy pheromones in overdrive, less-than-pristine
sneakers, familiar skin, Axe body spray (though at least he’d cut back since
all the werewolves started telling him how off-putting it was—apparently one
couldn’t just cut the Axe habit cold turkey), french fry grease, and fresh
grass.
But above all that was fear-panic-pain and the muzzy, unnerving scent of blood.
He tried to wiggle his shoulders to see if the chains had gained any give since
he’d been electrocuted. There was just a hint of slip; not enough to do
anything constructive with, but something—anything—to work with.
“Derek..?”
The werewolf looked up, his eyes flashing not at Stiles but at the men
approaching. He made a noise, made useless by the gag, but the men weren’t
coming for Stiles. They were leaving the boy alone, and Derek breathed a short-
lived sigh of relief.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
They were either too cowardly to drag him out of the cage or smart enough not
to. Derek snarled through his gag, his irises a bright red before they even
started attacking him through the bars. It wasn’t a coordinated effort. Each
man simply seemed to have found a piece of industrial debris and was using it
to the best of his abilities.
Derek tried to ride out the pain with pure, white-hot rage. These bastards had
come into his territory, threatened someone under his protection, and were
poking him like an animal in a zoo. But the longer they had at it, the longer
they broke bones that started to reknit almost immediately, the longer they
shoved in knives that had yet to hit anything vital, the better a chance that
someone in the pack would realize something was amiss. Stiles didn’t actually
skip classes anywhere near as often as Scott did. All it would take would be
one of them noticing and then trying to call.
He just had to buy more time.
A rib gave way with a sickening crack, and Derek could feel blood bubble up
from his nose. His snarl was pathetic, but it caught in his throat as a
familiar voice attempted to keep itself steady with false bravado.
“You girl scouts want to pick on someone your own size?”
No, no, no.
Stiles was an idiot. Yeah, they could probably kill him if they tried hard
enough, but they weren’t even trying. Derek would heal from all of it, but
Stiles didn’t have a werewolf’s ability to patch himself back up.
They couldn’t kill Derek by accident, but Stiles?
Stiles was only human.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
The worst part was having to watch. He could only throw himself helplessly
against the chains, not even able to reach the bars to rattle the cage
properly, as five grown men decided it was fair odds to start punching and
stomping on a high school kid. Stiles was keeping himself together as best he
could, and Derek felt a cold, bitter sense of pride in knowing he was trying to
tough it out. Stiles never claimed to be brave, but anyone else would have been
begging for mercy. The kid was smarter than that. Begging would only egg them
on.
Everyone had their boundaries, though, and the cigarettes and tacks broke
Stiles’ voice like it was made of spun sugar. Derek twisted harder, felt one of
the chains start to slip a little. If he could only get his wrist loose—
Derek practically felt the crunch when Stiles’ ribs cracked, and his howl was
raw and desperate through the makeshift gag.
They shocked the cage again after that, and despite his protests, Derek blacked
out. Stiles’ resigned whimper was the last thing he heard, his frightened brown
eyes as they hoisted him down from the ceiling hook the last thing he saw
before the world went black.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
He knew this was all about him.
His own body had started making bold headway into healing his injuries, into
knitting bones and riding the wave of adrenaline to speed up every metabolic
pathway. Stiles’, on the other hand, was being systematically broken down.
Stiles was being broken down. They were all over him, in him, and every muscle
in Derek’s body wanted to burst free. He half-shifted twice, three times, and
each time they electrocuted him again until one of them finally blew enough
wolfsbane dust in his face that he forgot how to breathe.
Over the sound of his own failed breaths, he could hear Stiles’ ragged gasps
and the grunts of the nameless men.
The more they tore Stiles apart, the deeper they shoved their scent into him,
the more filth they smeared on his skin, the more it said about Derek as an
Alpha. Marking Stiles said Derek was weak, that he couldn’t even protect a
human from other humans. But more gallingly, it said Stiles was Derek’s, and he
wasn’t even sure they got that part wrong.
He’d never thought about Stiles like that: as his, as his. Derek didn’t want
anyone on that level. Kate had left him so thoroughly wrecked that he didn’t
think he would ever want to get tangled up in anyone’s legs, tongue, heart.
But what he felt, what he thought he didn’t feel, none of it mattered. What
mattered was that they thought it was true, and they were going to kill Stiles
before it was all over and somehow frame Derek for it. Why they wanted him out
of the way, what their end goal was, that was for later. Right now Derek could
only growl, could only throw himself at the cage, could only catch Stiles’
bruised eyes when he looked over.
Not once did Stiles utter even a non-verbal plea. Not through any of it. And
Derek didn’t know if it was worse or if it was better, but every ragged sound
reminded him of the contrast, of his own time with a monster, of the way she’d
been all soft caresses and carefully-planned words and none of it, none of it
was like this, and there he was wallowing in that as a tragedy. His family had
been killed, and they had died horrific, slow deaths, and Derek’s body had been
left whole. Just as it was being left whole now, while once again everything
that signified anything significant in his life was being burned to death in
front of him.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
Stiles screamed.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
Whatever filter, whatever consciousness was left to Derek peeled away.
The chains had been too tight for Derek to transform; they still were.
He shifted anyway, the chains cutting deep into his muscle, bleeding too much
for his body to sustain, but the werewolf didn’t feel it.
They were killing Stiles.
They had claimed Stiles and they were killing him.
Stiles was his.
Stiles was his.
There was no easy way about it, not without dislocating his shoulder, both
wrists, and snapping the cartilage in his right knee, but Derek was out of the
cage, hackles high and eyes red, and it was the first time he had ever reached
this--the first time he was on four big paws, the first time his body looked
like that of the eponymous wolf rather than a warped man.
…did he roar?
The men—the hunters—had never seen this. He could see it in the panicked roll
of their eyes, could taste it as he tore into them. They didn’t even have time
to find the wolfsbane bullets, and there was no pausing to interrogate, to ask,
to demand why.
There was only bone and blood and intestines between his teeth, the glory of
finally doing something soaring through him even as bullets ripped into his
flank.
Normal bullets.
Normal men.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralBsm.jpg]
When it was done, when nothing was twitching, when everything was red, brown,
white bone, yellow fat, when everything was at its most basic state, Derek
shook out his fur. He understood then, understood what men feared. Understood
the primal memory of a god of destruction walking among them.
An eyeball twitched involuntarily in a skull that he’d bitten clean in half.
The werewolf padded over to it, relishing in the wetness of his fur, in the
softness between his toes where the gore squidged up. He lifted his leg, pissed
into the skull.
And then he found a patch of ribs and fat and threw himself into it, rolling
about, righteous, strong, alive.
       [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiralAsm.jpg]
The sound of Stiles vomiting roused some part of him, and Derek lifted his
head. Stiles’ body had gone limp over the barrel and no, no, that wouldn’t do.
Stiles reeked of them, reeked of every last atrocity they’d put him through,
reeked of their spit and their come and, now, their blood.
But Stiles was his. It was clear now, clearer than it had ever been when his
paws had been hands and his mind supposedly more capable of complex thought.
Some bestiaries still claimed the wolf and the man were two separate beings,
warring within one body. But a werewolf who’d been born, that was a different
creature. There had never been a time when Derek had not been this, and when
this had not been him. The part of him that wore a human skin was easily swayed
by emotions, but could perform fine motor functions, could use a cell phone,
could understand the niceties of human sentiment.
The part of him in thick black fur saw things more simply. Saw things as pack,
as food, as mate, as enemy. A part had to break, a part had to let loose, and
not even the loss of his family—horrifying yet distant, muted, unwitnessed—had
shattered the final barrier between man and inner predator.
Derek Hale was not one thing, and the wolf was not another. They were the same.
And the wolf sneered at how much he’d overcomplicated this.
Stiles’ body was limp but not lifeless. Derek licked him slowly, lapping the
gore off his face before nuzzling his short-cropped hair with a cold, black
nose. Stiles didn’t stir.
No, the part of him that wore the skin of a man had been too wrapped up in his
own troubles to see what was in front of him.
But now he could see.
Derek’s canines were each 5” long, his jaws finely hinged and strong enough to
crush solid stone. His teeth closed with utmost gentleness over the ugly ropes,
severing them one tug at a time. He had to try twice—first with a calf, then
with Stiles’ shoulder—before he found a grip that was good and true.
Stiles was hurt.
Stiles was his.
He would keep him safe.
He would keep him safe, because Stiles belonged to the pack, and Stiles
belonged to his family, and Stiles belonged to him.
And he belonged to Stiles.
It was as simple as that.
        [http://i1242.photobucket.com/albums/gg522/kaihire/spiral.gif]
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