I. extinguish my eyes, I'll go on seeing you

He knows as soon as he steps into the apartment - feels the scent spread across his skin like oil the second he opens the door. Heavy, thick, cloying. Fear.

Laura is sitting at the kitchen table, whiter than her leotard, wound tighter than her bun. On the screen is a news article, coverage of a murder in Beacon Hills. The name itself is enough to send a pang through him, stirring up grief that isn't nearly old enough but it's the picture that says it all.

A burning spiral and a series of previously unconnected homicides.

A burning spiral.

He doesn't realize he's shaking until he feels his keys slip through his fingers but even when he does, Derek can't make it stop.

"Is it-?"

Laura shakes her head but not like she's saying no. It's a slow-quick snap, instinctive. Afraid. "I don't know. I don't know. Shit, Derek, what if it's-"

She can't say it either. Because it might be. It really might and that -

It hits him like a gust of wind, sudden and strong. Leaves him shaking in earnest as the thought cuts through him with the worst kind of hope.

Please. Please.

He hadn't even known he had hope left.

They can't pick a radio station.

The recycled air in the car reeks of burning plastic.

Derek is pretty sure he hates the Camaro but can't decide if that's because it's taking them back to Beacon Hills or because it isn't taking them fast enough.

He hasn't had an appetite since he saw the article. He thinks it's the same for Laura because after the first day they don't bother stopping to eat. The fast food just sits in his stomach.

"We could stop," she says somewhere in Nebraska but it's a lie and they both know it. Whatever happens there is no stopping. No going back. There can't be. Not until they know for sure.

She drives until she can't. He drives until he can't. When they hit California, they pull over so Derek can puke at the side of the road.

Two days between his new life and his old. Two days. It had felt safer than that, but he knows now they've never been safe. Never. Not for one second in three years.

Laura's driving when they hit the city limits and then she has to puke, too.

Even through the reek from the car vents he can smell what's left of the house.

Laura cries, fists her hands in Peter's jacket like she can't bear to let go. Like he might vanish if she doesn't have her hands on him but Derek froze the minute he saw them through the trees and now he can't bring himself to move.

It's Peter and it's not. It's -

His skin is -

And he chose that. He let it stay that way for god knows what reason. It's obscene. A lurid reminder of everything Derek's worked for years now to bury, but it's the eyes that really terrify him. The red gleam and the half-smothered betrayal and the longing that halted Derek's progress, left him caught somewhere between relief so powerful it hurts and guilt so fierce he's afraid it might actually kill him.

And worse, Peter's not alone. There's this kid with him standing off to the side, shoulders hunched, hands in his pockets and everything about his posture is casual except his eyes. Whiskey brown and deep enough to drown in if Derek's not careful. At least that's what it feels like when he meets them.

Stiles, Derek remembers, the Sheriff's son.

Stiles might not be a born wolf but Derek thinks maybe he was meant to be. There's something savage there, lurking. Something hungry. Stiles who stood with him while his world burned down. He was a child then and he's a child now but it doesn't stop the thrill that slices through Derek at the sight of him.

Ravenously, his mind supplies. Stiles is looking at him ravenously, and if the electric way his nerves light up under the scrutiny is any indication, Derek likes it. A lot.

He can't handle that either, though, so he looks away.

Stiles is fifteen and Derek is obviously more of a sick fuck then he gave himself credit for but he's disgustingly relieved to have something to focus on that isn't the poreless gleam of Peter's melted face or the hollow ache where Peter used to be pack.

It makes sense that his uncle became an Alpha. Piecemeal packs split all the time and it's not unusual for multiple alphas to crop up when they do but Derek can't reconcile the space in his chest with the fact of his uncle. He just... he can't.

Which is why he's pathetically grateful that where Peter goes Stiles seems to follow, motion and sound and sprawling limbs, draping himself over whatever's nearest; shifting when he miscalculates his length. Stiles is puppy long, hands and feet too big for his spindly arms and legs. Legs that Derek is pretty certain go on for actual days. He should know, he's spent several just staring.

Stiles grins when he catches Derek's eye, lascivious and mocking in a way no fifteen year old should be. It reminds Derek of the legends his mother used to tell them at bedtime. Epic stories about the people of the mounds. Lithe and pale and deadly. Sharp tongues and sharper knives.

Watching Stiles, Derek could believe they'd been real once, glittering, dangerous beings that made you want to slice off your own skin just for the chance to be near them.

When he isn't thinking about Stiles he's thinking about Peter and since he's avoiding thinking about Peter -

Derek hates himself for wanting the distraction but can't bring himself to stop.

Laura waits for a quiet moment, voice pitched low while Stiles and Peter bicker in the kitchen. There's a symmetry there that can't be ignored, a casual intimacy that goes beyond pack. It leaves a taste like acid in the back of Derek's throat, makes him want to pull Stiles away and get in Peter's face, but really, how is that any better?

How is he any better when most of the reason he wants to pull Stiles away is so he can do the same thing?

The taste in his throat turns to ash.

"It's not in my head, right?" she asks, the genuine concern there making Derek starkly aware of just how fucked up he really is if he's jealous of someone else abusing a kid.

Stiles swipes at Peter's face, an easy grin on his face that doesn't quite manage to look innocent as Peter ducks, unrepentant and casually smug.

"No," Derek says. "It's not."

When Peter turns away, though, the grin disappears, sliding off Stiles's face like it never existed and in its place is... Derek doesn't have a name for what he sees but it makes him wonder if his instincts aren't wrong. If Peter isn't the one he should be pulling away and that -

Why would he need to -

But that look.

It's on the tip of his tongue to say something, to ask Laura if she's seeing it, too, that silver sharp edge in Stiles's eyes, but like he can sense the bend of Derek's thoughts Stiles glances his way and the look is gone as quickly as it came.

The grin Stiles throws Derek isn't innocent, either, and just like that the last thing he wants is for Laura to notice.

When Derek works up the courage to glance at her, he's relieved and ashamed all once that's she's watching Peter and didn't see.

There are things he wasn't expecting, things he didn't know and still doesn't understand.

Stiles is careless words and cutting gestures. Initially Derek thought it was because he couldn't be still but he's beginning to think it's a ruse to hide an inner stillness. There's a watchful quiet that's constantly aware in Stiles. There are glimpses of it if you're paying attention, and Derek is. Stiles is, too, though. To everything and everyone, all the time, but above and beyond that he is perpetually, relentlessly aware of Derek.

It should be frightening to realize he's under that kind of scrutiny but all Derek can feel is relief. One of the reasons he's avoided relationships so fervently is that he'd have to explain. Why he doesn't want to talk. Why he doesn't like nails against his neck and can't stand the smell of jasmine. Why he hates being called anything other than his name.

He really, really hates terms of endearment.

And Stiles knows that - all of those things, probably, but if he doesn't already he will. Because Stiles is watching. Stiles has curved that focus around him.

Part of him hates Stiles for that because the last thing Derek needs is another excuse. Not half as much as he hates himself for blaming Stiles at all, though.

It's Stiles who finds him, unsurprisingly. Stiles will always find him, probably, if he wants to. Sometimes it seems like Stiles can learn as much from an absence as a presence, shape the gaps in his facts and data into stunningly accurate pictures.

Stiles saw Derek's absence so he found him. The method really doesn't make a difference.

It seems to take forever and no time at all for Stiles to crouch, miles of leg folding up until he's got a hand on the back of Derek's neck and an eyeful of Laura's body. What's left of Laura's body.

What's left of Derek.

It's easier than the fire.

It's a thousand times worse than the fire.

Laura is dead.

Even thinking it opens a black, ragged hole in his chest.

The scent of gunpowder and wolfsbane burns in his lungs. "Hunters," Derek says, and he's surprised his voice is steady - surprised he still has a voice at all.

Stiles's eyes flash gold even as his hand tightens on Derek's neck. "Argents," he corrects, jerking his head toward the knife. "That belongs to Chris."

And Derek feels his world lurch, feels his heart shift in his chest because that might be Chris Argent's knife but it reeks of -

Nails scratching against his scalp, a little too hard but he doesn't complain because even when she's hurting him she's the best thing he can imagine having. The only thing he wants.

Derek presses his nose to the inside of her wrist, watches her eyes go dark and all he can smell is -

"Kate," he says, and there's the break in his voice he was expecting. His weakness always wins out in the end. "That's her perfume."

Turns out he killed his sister, too.

The grip on his neck tightens. Not a hint of nail. Stiles bites them off before they can grow so it's skin on skin even as he shifts to block Laura from view.

"Derek." And when he still won't look up, Stiles just pulls him in until he can hide his face against Stiles's neck, until his entire world narrows to that stretch of skin. Stiles's heart beat. Stiles's breath. Stiles's scent, like moss and sweat and wind. Like he shifted on his way over, slipped into his fur to find Derek faster.

He doesn't mean to say it, has no plans to speak at all but his traitor voice that should've deserted him says, "I'm an omega," and god, he hadn't even thought of that but he is.

Stiles huffs a laugh, hot and wet against Derek's shoulder. It raises gooseflesh across Derek's skin, leaves him keenly aware of the cold. "You're really not," he says, fingers rubbing gently between the dips of Derek's spine.

"Peter-"

"Derek. That is never going to happen to you, all right? You are never, ever going to be alone." Something must betray the hopelessness he feels because Stiles squeezes, his grip almost painful but it's what Derek needs, that connection. Stiles barely knows him, hasn't seen him in years, and how screwed up is it that a fifteen year old kid is the one protecting him?

When it comes right down to it, though, there's nothing childish about Stiles. From his winnowed body to his old eyes, Stiles is grounded. Stiles is sure. He's everything Derek isn't and he smells like home.

"You and me? We're pack," he says, fingers sliding along the column of Derek's spine. "That's not going to change. Not for anyone or anything, ever." Then he sets his teeth against the skin of Derek's neck and it's like a soft reset on Derek's brain. Every muscle in his body goes limp, loose and relaxed and it's completely wrong.

It shouldn't happen, shouldn't even be possible. Stiles isn't an alpha or family but Derek can feel himself unwinding, opening under Stiles in a way that screams submission, every instinct sighing, Yes.

He wants to know why Stiles cares in the first place, why it matters at all to some kid his uncle took advantage of that Derek might be an omega, but he's just so wretchedly grateful that someone still wants him - that he isn't alone - he can't bring himself to ask.

Peter doesn't say anything when they tell him. What is there to say? Laura is dead.

The last of their family is dead.

They don't pretend they count for each other. It wasn't Derek Peter hugged when they came back.

It's Derek Stiles sits beside, though; who Stiles won't stop touching. A hand on Derek's back. His shoulder against Derek's shoulder. Warmth and heat seeping into Derek's skin until his body remembers them.

He's got mixed feelings on that. Mostly he wishes Stiles had left him for dead, though. He might as well be since everything he was goes into the ground with Laura. They bury her under a wolfsbane spiral near the old house. She deserves to keep her shape no matter how painful the process.

Sometimes Stiles knows what Derek needs before Derek does, like how Stiles starts sleeping in Derek's room without discussion. There's no hesitation at the door way, not even the hint of it despite the fact that Stiles is entering what should by all rights be another wolf's territory.

It's almost like they really are pack, like Derek's space is as familiar to Stiles as his own. He certainly treats it that way, shucking his clothing and climbing into bed between Derek and the door, arm thrown over Derek's waist to keep him close with absent-minded possessiveness.

Derek hadn't even known he'd been afraid until he sleeps like that, curled between Stiles and the wall. Hadn't known what he was missing until it steals through him, warm and steady and good. So horribly good.

He feels safe even though he knows he's not.

It's too much and not enough and it's wrong. He knows it's wrong. Stiles is young - too young for Derek and way too young for Peter but when their eyes meet in the dark, Derek can't help feeling like he's the child. Like Stiles is trying to be careful with him, as if he's the one who might break.

It feels a lot like the truth.

He still can't make himself stop. He just... he wants. He wants so many things and this is one of them. Stiles in his bed, holding him, and it's something he can have. Something he's been given; maybe something he can keep.

He's lost so much. He can't-

Those eyes are just so bright.

He doesn't mean to say it. He'd intended not to, but seeing Stiles stretched out across the bed - Derek still hasn't decided if it's his or theirs even though Stiles has slept in it every night since they found Laura - he'd let himself sink a little too far into that safe feeling and the words just popped out without his permission.

That's getting to be a bad habit where Stiles is concerned. A fact that is, in itself, concerning.

"Why are we doing this?" he asks and Stiles frowns, tipping his head back at an improbable angle to look Derek in the eye.

"Why are we what? Planning to kill the woman responsible for destroying our families? Pretty sure that question answers itself."

"Don't be stupid. You know what I mean."

"You should patent that bitch-face. I bet you could sell it to Kripke and make a fortune." Stiles wriggles onto his side to put Derek in view, somehow managing to look fidgety and graceful both. "I don't really know what you want me to say here. She should pay so she's going to."

Derek has to swallow twice before he can speak, torn between feeling like a traitor for questioning their motives and his increasing doubts about their goal. "And that's right? That's not justice, Stiles."

"Because it was so just when Laura had her throat slit? Or when Peter killed your mom so she wouldn't burn to death?"

He can feel himself going white, flinches harder than if Stiles had actually hit him. He still can't tell if Stiles means to hurt him or just can't pull his punches but really it's irrelevant because if Kate deserves to suffer Derek does, too, and there's just no softening that.

Stiles sighs, breath heavy with responsibility that absolutely should not be his. "It's not about justice, Derek, it's about revenge. It's not right. Nothing is right. There is no right anymore. That stopped being an option when she used you like that."

Derek's heart seizes in his chest so audibly that Stiles glances down, two little lines creasing the skin between his eyebrows but he doesn't move. In fact, he goes completely still while Derek's world tilts on its axis, vertigo and numbness swamping his senses until all he can hear is blood rushing through his veins, every muscle quivering like his body is trying to come apart.

With exaggerated slowness, each movement drawn out and careful, Stiles sits up and Derek wants to snap at him for it - he isn't made of glass - but considering the pit in his stomach threatening to engulf him, maybe he is.

"It didn't make sense that they went to the basement unless they thought there was a way out. And there would have been if she hadn't blocked the tunnel. It doesn't take a genius to figure out why you smell like guilt every time you look at Peter's scars."

He thinks, Yes, and, Please, no, and maybe it's fitting that he should lose this, too, but then, why...?

Distantly, it occurs to Derek he's in shock.

"Here's the thing, though, you aren't the one who set your house on fire. She's why Peter is so fucked up. She's the reason my dad's dead and why you hate yourself for something that isn't your fault so if you're looking for a reason, there you go. That's why we're doing this. Someone should pay for all the shitty trickle down we get to live with because of her."

Still moving carefully, Stiles slides a hand into Derek's hair, tugging not quite gently. There's no pity in his eyes, only fondness and want, his gaze trailing down the line of Derek's neck more intimately than a touch.

"You can have what you want, you know. You just have to ask. Or take," Stiles adds. "Taking's good, too. Taking's great, really, when it comes right down to it."

Derek doesn't know which is more surreal to consider: that Stiles might be joking or the very real possibility that he isn't.

Either way, it's the worst kind of relief when Stiles leaves. It means Derek gets to be alone when the shock wears off and the panic sets in because what if he tells Peter.

It's not an accident. It would be easier to live with if -

He tells himself it doesn't matter.

He lies.

Derek spends two days snapping at Peter and Stiles, snarling and vicious like the animal he surely is but it doesn't help. Stiles reeks of arousal every time Derek gets in his space, pheromones and teenage lust belying the disinterested look on Stiles's face. It's fucked up the way he seems to get off on being threatened, eyes glowing with interest when Derek puts him against a wall and that's -

What the hell did Peter do to this kid?

What the hell did this kid do to Peter? Peter smells like bitterness and rage every time he catches Derek with his hands on Stiles, glares at them both like he can't decide which of them to hate. It's Peter who looks away when he meets Stiles's gaze, which is just...

Peter's the Alpha. It doesn't make sense that he'd turn away.

Two days trying to put distance between them and every time, Stiles just looks at him, blank faced and neutral like it doesn't make a difference to him what Derek does. Like he could do anything and Stiles would stand there, would take it...

He's so fucking tired of trying to do right by this kid when all it does is bring out the worst in him so fine, Stiles wants worst? Derek can give it to him.

He shoves Stiles into the doorframe, pins him there with an arm across his collarbone and drops his weight until all the air rushes out of Stiles in a huff. Leaves him red-faced and gasping, slack and blissed out under Derek's grip like this is exactly what he was hoping for.

It's not an accident, but Derek kind of wishes it was because then maybe it would be an accident that when Stiles sucks in a breath, Derek chases it with his tongue.

There's an ease between them he envies, a similarity he can't quite name and doesn't want to. He's afraid he won't like what it's called.

Afraid it sounds an awful lot like 'love.'

"No."

Stiles glares, sullen and indignant when Peter plucks the bag of chips from his hands.

"Dude-"

"I am not going to pay to have my car detailed because you got crumbs all over the seat."

"I'll pay you back when I'm eighteen," Stiles sneers.

"I'll buy you dinner when we're done," Peter counters, tossing the bag into the backseat.

Calculation radiates from Stiles and Derek can practically hear him weighing the cost of a stake out against his favorite foods.

"I want a Burger As Big As Your Head from Joe's."

"Fine."

"And I want curly fries."

"Fine."

"And a milkshake."

"Stiles."

"I want the shake or I'm going for the chips."

Peter sighs. "That's probably the least threatening threat you've ever made towards me."

"Which is why it would be petty," Stiles agrees, "to quibble over something so small."

Peter's glare only makes Stiles grin and it's that - that casual disregard - that makes Derek's skin crawl because it's unnatural. Stiles is a beta, he should want to please his Alpha. It should be hardwired into him but it's not.

"I regret you every day," Peter says, and Stiles's grin shifts into something fond, pleasantly confused; a little surprised.

"Wow, you really don't mean that, do you?"

Derek quietly grips the hand rest in the backseat until it dents.

"If I knew you liked it that rough I would have-" It's mocking, but there's real bitterness in Peter's tone that makes Derek's stomach twist. It's part guilt and part possessiveness because while he hates that it hurts his uncle he wants Stiles more. Now that Laura -

And with Peter like he is. Derek needs to know that Stiles is there, will always be there like he said. He needs Stiles to be pack and if Derek has to sell what's left of his soul - become the monster they're trying to kill - to keep him, he'll do it.

Peter already broke that part of Stiles, anyway. It's not like staying away will fix it.

The rationalization doesn't make him feel less disgusting. If anything it makes him feel worse but self-loathing isn't exactly new.

Stiles swipes half-heartedly in Peter's direction, quick but without real force. "Finish that statement and you're going to owe me a lot more than dinner."

It's too easy in the end. It feels cheap, watching the her eyes roll back in her head while Stiles chokes her out. Makes his stomach turn the way it does when he thinks of her touching him. Or of touching her.

Stiles and Peter make it look so easy, like it makes no difference to them, her skin on their skin as they load her into the trunk. Like it doesn't matter, shouldn't matter when Peter fists a hand in her hair and drags her into the tunnels.

Maybe it doesn't. Maybe none of it matters at all.

She sits there, wriggling, looking for any way out, any chance she might get some part of herself free, her eyes sliding between him and them like she can't decide whether to watch the threat or hope for mercy.

Like it's something he could grant even if he wanted to.

"Derek-" Her voice quavers a little then cuts off altogether when Stiles backhands her casually, hard enough to split her lip and snap her head to the side.

His voice, though, is completely calm. "Don't speak to him."

She tongues at the blood, something resigned in her face when she looks up at him. "Or what?"

Stiles frowns, thinking. "You can still scream with your tongue cut out, right?"

"Yup," Peter answers.

"There you go." And then in a voice that's lost all its pretense of congeniality, Stiles reiterates, "Don't speak to him."

Turns out you can scream plenty with your tongue still in, too, and she does, over and over, but not to Derek. She listens in a way he's never seen her do, not in bed, not with Chris and certainly not with him, but she listens to Stiles and Derek wants to beg, to plead with him on her behalf.

"Look, see? She's doing what you told her, she's being good. Just let her die. Let her die, please, make it end."

He says nothing - just watches as they take her apart, shaking like he's the one under the knife until finally Stiles is there, between him and the horror like before. Like in the clearing with Laura and it doesn't even matter that Stiles is responsible for this because he's there and that's more than Derek can say about anyone else.

He doesn't wait for Stiles to pull him in this time. He can't. He needs something to hold, something real. Maybe this is what it's like for turned wolves, he thinks - what it was like for Stiles. Your body torn apart by urges you can't parse out until you're afraid you'll go mad with it if you haven't already. Until you clutch at anything, anything, so long as it anchors you to yourself.

Derek wants to ask, "Is that what you did with Peter?"

Instead, he lets himself be moved, focuses on breathing and the heat of Stiles's skin where it's soaking into him until they're outside and god, but that first hit of fresh air is enough to make him dizzy - enough to set him shaking again after he'd managed to stop.

Stiles leans in, nose pressed under Derek's ear as he draws in a heavy breath, his sigh somewhere between rapturous and turned on.

For an instant, all Derek can feel is Stiles's grip, hard and too tight. They're pressed together from head to hip, Stiles a hard line against him, bone and sinew and Derek wants to rip open his skin and crawl inside.

Stiles squeezes the back of his neck and steps away. Says, "Come on."

Derek makes it about three steps before he launches himself at Stiles, plasters him against the side of Peter's car and the thought of that only gets him more worked up. Peter smelling the two of them against the driver's side door, smelling Stiles and him together and hating it more.

Stiles is squirming, not quite fighting. Writhing around like he wants leverage he can't find without pushing Derek away.

"Derek." And god, but the breathy little way Stiles says his name, needy and desperate like he never is at other times.

Because maybe Stiles does need him, as much as Derek needs Stiles, even, but he doesn't show it. It's not on display like Derek's desperation and it's too new for Derek to trust that it's there. It's still -

He needs proof. He needs -

Derek gets one hand around Stiles throat, uses the other to open Stiles's jeans and when Derek gets a hand on him the noise Stiles makes is just perfect. A keening, whimpery sort of sound that makes something in Derek's chest clench, his breath catch. The sort of sound that makes him want to take Stiles apart just to get it back.

He settles for dragging out new ones. And if he likes the way Stiles arches when Derek bites a little too hard, the way he makes it hurt a little when Stiles comes, his fist tight and pumping well past the point when it feels good, well.

It's not like he didn't already know he was fucked up. He just keeps finding new depths to it, like the way he ruts against Stiles soft cock so hard Stiles cries, tears slipping down his cheeks and onto Derek's tongue.

Stiles leaves Derek at home with some hot tea and a kiss.

He comes back a day later stinking like Peter's blood. Peter isn't with him.

Derek doesn't ask.